


Take My Stars and Sail

by EasternStarling (Solaris00)



Category: Newsies - All Media Types
Genre: Action/Adventure, Actually some kind of just general angst, Alternate Universe - Space, And some epic spaceship battles, Gun references, M/M, Minor Character Death, Outer Space, Sprace angst, cool laser fights!, mature language, mention of death/dying, mild violence, spaceship au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-03
Updated: 2018-05-22
Packaged: 2019-05-01 20:26:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 56,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14528517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Solaris00/pseuds/EasternStarling
Summary: In a space punk AU, Captain Jack Kelly commands the SS Manhattan to the farthest reaches of the universe with his crew he affectionately calls 'Junkies'. All is going well until one day the crew discovers a pair of stowaways in their ship--and after that, it all goes to hell.





	1. The SS Manhattan

**Part one.**

_Do I dare disturb the universe?_

_In a minute there is time_

_For revisions and decisions_

_Which a minute will reverse._

 

* * *

 

 

In the dark depths of the stars, just across the Seven Rings of Seagram and behind the broken pieces of a moon, an old Junker ship floated lazily in the shadows.

Across its wide, metal hull read: _SS MANHATTAN,_ the red lettering peeling away at the edges, illuminated by a stars reflection emanating from the moon shards. The bright-lights were shut off, and the structure creaked and groaned as it rolled to one side. As it did, a window on the starboard side rose up into the light, and a single crew member was draped against it.

He tugged on his hat and watched as the captivating starlight danced across the darkened sky like twinkling diamonds. It had been ages since he’s seen a sunrise, but this...this came close enough.

He couldn’t bring himself to look away, even as he heard the familiar uneven gait of his crew mate behind him.

“Beautiful, huh?” Crutchie murmured and Jack smiled.

“Yeah,” he replied, the corner of his mouth twisting down in a mix of melancholy and nostalgia as a thought occurred to him. “Not as beautiful as home though.”

Crutchie pursed his lips. “You’re still going on about that? Come on, Jack. You can’t see any of this,” he gestured out the window, “back on Earth.”

“I know, I know,” Jack said, holding up his hands. “But I’ve seen enough of _this_ to last me a lifetime.”

They fell silent, his words ringing in their ears. Space can be loud, incredibly so, but at times like these, early in the calculated mornings and when the rest of the ship is asleep… space can be maddeningly quiet.

“You really gonna leave?” Crutchie’s voice was low and soft, and one eye was squinted like he was ready to flinch at the answer he knew was coming.

At the tone, Jack finally broke his gaze away and forced a smile. It killed him to see Crutchie upset, they’ve been like brothers for years. “Nah,” he laughed, pulling Crutchie toward him and ruffling his hair affectionately. “Not yet.”

He splayed his palm out against the window, covering the glittering dots in the distance. “I’ve got too much left to do here.” Crutches grinned and pushed him away. “You’d love it though, Crutchie. Earth.” Crutchie sent him a skeptical look, and Jack rested a hand on his shoulder. “D’you know, there they’ve got this thing there called _rain._ It’s like the stars are falling from the sky, except it’s _water_ —as much as you can possibly drink and more.”

“Really?” Crutchie whispered wonderingly, the skepticism gone.The light bathed his hair in gold and stars gleamed innocently in his eyes.

“Honest,” Jack said, settling into an easy and genuine grin. The crew mates all loved his stories of Earth. They’d clamor all day just for a piece of one of his fragmented memories. The _Manhattan_ was their home, their whole life, but… it didn’t hurt to dream of a planet in green and blue and far away from an old hunk of steel.

“And they’ve got these tiny moving metal machines that travel along paths and Crutchie, they can take you anywhere.”

“Anywhere?”

“Yeah, anywhere. On Earth, there aren’t any tethers or gravity simulators. On Earth, you can go anywhere you want and see anything you want. Crutch, on Earth you can _run_ , really _run_ , through giant fields bigger than any old junker ship. You can feel the wind in your face and it’s like you’re being carried away.”

Crutchie had a dreamy smile resting lightly on his face. He stared out the window, and he was nearly manifesting the pictures of Earth by sheer thought. Jack patted him on the shoulder. “You’d love it there,” he said. “And you’ll see it soon.”

“I want to see it…” Crutchie whispered, his longing ghosting across his lips.

“Soon,” Jack promised. “Not yet, but soon.”

The dawning light finally filled the room, washing them with gold, and right on cue, the ship’s wake-up alarm began to blare, snapping them both out of their reverie.

“Alright,” Jack said, clapped his hands together. “Let’s get started.”

 

* * *

 

“Wake up, Junkies! Let’s go, let’s go!” Jack banged against every door as he made his way down the halls. His shouting plus the alarm made a racket so loud that within minutes bleary-eyed Junkies were falling out their rooms in various states of disarray. “Mush, Tommy Boy, Specs, Albert, come on, time to get up!”

In one of the last rooms, Albert stirred under his covers and groaned. Race, buttoning up his crew jacket, shoved at the lump on the bed. “You heard the man, Albert. Get your lazy ass out of bed!”

Albert groaned and threw off the covers. “I was having the most wonderful dream,” he sighed, catching the bandana Race tossed to him and tying it on.

“Ooh, a pretty lady?”

Albert scoffed and threw one of Race’s shoes back at him. “No, I was bunking with someone else.”

“Fuck you too, Albert,” came the response.

“You boys done yet?” Elmer asked, walking out of the bathroom with nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist. “Shower’s ready.”

“Why’re you awake so early?” Albert asked, stuffing a leg into his cargo pants.

Elmer winked. “Thought I’d surprise your mom.”

Another Junkie stuck his head in through the open doorway. “If you can find her!” he jeered, and promptly ducked as a book hurtled toward his face.

“Get the fuck outta here!” Race shouted.

“Hey, hey watch your language!” Romeo shouted from the room over. His and Specs’ laughter carried through the thin walls.

“You’re one to talk, Romeo,” Finch called from yet another room. “I’m pretty sure I heard a bad word from you after you lost to Buttons at poker last night!”

“I’d be cursing pretty heavily if I lost a hundred thousand credits in an hour, too,” Jojo commented as he walked out the door, still brushing his hair.

“You lost a hundred grand?!” Race shouted. “Buttons, hey man, we’re friends right?”

Buttons, who was already dressed and ready to go, shot him a wry grin through the doorway. “Depends. Think I could have a go at _The Corona?_ ”

“No way, not after you crashed it against an asteroid last time. How ‘bouts a bottle of whiskey from Jack’s shelf?”

“Was it Henry’s ass?” Tommy Boy cackled as he finally dragged himself from his boy. Henry slapped him, “you’re not funny, T,” but Tommy Boy just laughed harder.

“Hey! You better not be bargaining with my alcohol, Race!” Jack shouted. “You could make a hundred grand if you’d just listen to my orders and stop navigating us into asteroid belts just for fun.” Tommy Boy snickered, and Henry slapped him again. Race opened his mouth to retort, but went after Albert instead when he fell off the bed laughing.

“You shut up, Al—!”

“Hey hey, Crutchie!” Finch shouted as the boy limped down the hall after Jack. “Where we going today?”

“That’s up to Jack if he wants to tell you,” Crutchie responded.

“Aw, just give us a hint!”

“Yeah, and are there strippers there? What? A man’s got needs!”

“You’re barely a man, Romeo.”

“You know where you can stick that slingshot of yours—?”

“Ooh, language!”

“Albert, I swear to god, if you touch my chocolate stash again, I’ll—“

“It wasn’t me, Race!”

“Elmer, then, you prick—“

“What you looking at me for? I don’t even like chocolate!”

“Bullshit—“

“So Crutchie, any hints?” Finch shouted.

“Nope.”

“Aw, you know nobody likes you when you’re like this.”

“‘Course they do,” Crutchie said smugly. “I got personality. Ain’t nobody who don’t like me.”

“Come on, you crazy stowaways! We’re burning fuel out here!” Jack shouted from further down the hallway, and the rest of the boys hurried to put on their uniforms.

“Hows ‘bout you, CJ? You tell us where we’re going today?” Finch asked as he caught up to Jack.

“Aw don’t bother the Captain,” Race said. “The poor guy don’t even know his way to the breakfast bar. Speaking of which, Jack, did you see anyone with my chocolate?”

Jack smacked Race on the back as a response and sent him scurrying down the hall and onto the deck. He took a seat in the captain’s chair and settled in as Junkies filled the seats around him.

“Alright boys,” he said, and the bickering stopped as they all turned to listen. “Today, we’re headed out a little farther. We’re going to—“

Before he could finish, an alarm suddenly blared on the monitor next to Specs. The Junkie rushes to check it.

“What is it?” Jack asked, leaning forward.

“Looks like a motion sensor was tripped in the backup cargo bay, Captain.”

Jack furrowed his eyebrows and the room tensed. “Anybody been down there?” Everyone shook their heads. “Anyone unaccounted for? Where’s Smalls?”

“Still sick in bed, Cap,” Jojo said. “Saw him just a few moments ago.”

“And everyone else is here. So then—“

“Jack?” Race said in a small voice. “My chocolate stash was gone this morning.”

The room fell deathly silent as that implication settled onto their shoulders.

“Boys,” Jack said grimly. “Grab your pistols. We got a stowaway on board.”

 

* * *

 

Race and Albert pressed against the darkened corridor wall, their fingers tight against the plastic of their pistols.

“Race?” Albert whispered.

“Yeah?”

They crept around a corner and scanned the dark for movement. Nothing.

“If I die, I want you to have my laptop. Just promise to do one thing for me.”

“What’s that,” Race asked, distracted by an odd shape in the shadows.

“Delete the browsing history. There’s some fucked up shit on there.”

Race stopped to turn slowly and give Albert a look. The Junkie smiled wickedly, unable to keep a straight face. “You motherfucker.”

“Well, actually, that’s one of the—“

“Shh!” Something clattered in the dark and Race pulled Albert back behind a wall. They ducked down as Race fumbled for his thermal camera, but his fingers slipped in the dark. “Shit.”

Jack’s voice crackled over the radio. “Anything?” 

“Maybe,” Albert whispered. “Give us a sec.”

Race finally managed to pull it up and he carefully leaned around the corner.

On the screen was a myriad of blues and greens—inanimate objects—but somewhere in the mix there was a blurry outline of red. As Race watched, the blob slowly moved, reaching up with what seemed to be a arm, and then the blob split in two. “Shit.”

“There’s two figures, Jack,” he reported over the Com system. “Human, looks like. One is small… maybe a kid.”

“Okay,” Jack responded immediately. “Be careful, but see if you can get a closer look.”

Race sighed and handed the camera to Albert, then pulled out his pistol again. “How did I get stuck on this job?”

He motioned for Albert to go left, and began to creep around the corner. He turned on his helmet, suddenly bathing the bay in a bright white light.

“Come out!” he shouted, his pistol right in the air. He saw Albert move up from the other side. “Hands where I can see them!”

No response, no movement. He made eye contact with Albert and nodded. The two of them inched forward.

“We don’t want to hurt you,” Albert said. “But we will.”

Race glared at him. He shrugged. ‘What?’ he mouthed, but Race just shook his head.

“We’re gonna give you until the count of five to come out,” Race said loudly. “One. Two. Three—“

Suddenly, out of the shadows, a person leaped out. Race and Albert jumped back as the figure—the... _short_ figure—brandished a stick.

“Woah!” Albert yelled.

“Stay back!” the person shouted desperately, his voice high and shrill. “Don’t come any closer, I’m warning you!”

Race looked him up and down, then slowly lowered his gun. “Okay,” he said calmly. “We’re not going to hurt you. See? I’m putting my gun on the ground.” He nodded at Albert and, after a brief pause, he slowly put his gun down too. “Now your turn.”

The kid hesitated, glancing nervously back into the shadows.he tightened his grip on the stick.  

“Come on…” Race muttered. “Come on…”

Finally, the kid nodded and lowered his weapon too. Albert moved up a carefully kicked it away, then bent before the kid and began speaking comfortingly to him.

“Race to Jack,” he said, pressing the call button and watching Albert.

“Go for Jack,” the Captain quickly replied.

“Jack, it’s a kid.”

The line was silent. “Was he alone?”

Race stepped closer to hear what the two were saying.

“Do you have a family?” Albert asked. The kid quickly shook his head.

“It’s just me,” he said, a little too fast, but his eyes darted back into the corner.

Race followed his gaze, and slowly stepped forward. He shone a light into the darkness and froze.

Deep in the corner, hidden in the shadows, the body of a boy was slumped against the wall. His face was a pale and sickly shade of white and his breaths were shallow and shaky. His eyes fluttered for a moment when the light fell on him, but otherwise he was lifeless.

“You’re alone, huh?” Race said, turning accusingly toward the boy, who was watching him sadly.

“His name’s Davey. He’s my brother.” The kid hesitated for a moment, conflict on his face, before he steeled himself. “He’s real sick. D’you think you can help him?”

Race exchanged a glance with Albert, and took his hand off the Com system.

“Yeah,” he sighed, gently putting his hand on the kid’s tense shoulder.

“We can help him.”

 

* * *

 

“Who are they?” Jack asked, staring down at the boy in his sick bay, arms folded.

“The kid is Les and the guy’s name is Davey,” Crutchie said, leaning on his crutch. “Les said that they was on the run when his brother got sick and couldn’t move anymore. He dragged his brother onto the nearest ship and hid.”

“But we haven’t touched down for at least a few weeks,” Jack frowned. “They was on here this whole time?”

Crutchie shrugged. “I guess so. Remember when we couldn’t find any of the cereal? And Smalls did get sick a couple days ago...”

Jack looked at him in alarm. “You think what’s he’s got is contagious? Like, a plague?”

“There’s a plague?!” Romeo jumped up from where he was sitting and reading a newspaper.  

“No, there’s no plague, Romeo calm down,” Jojo sighed, pushing him back in his seat. “All Smalls’ got is a cold. Think this guy's got some kind of jumped up case of the flu, but it’s past being airborn. No plague.”

“That’s good, at least,” Crutchie said in relief.

“How long do you think it will take for him to get better?” Jack asked, looking down at the pale and shivering boy.

“A week at most? We just need his fever to break, and now that we’ve got him on meds that should go quick.”

“Alright. Thanks Jojo.” As Jojo nodded and left the room (taking Romeo with him), Race stepped up next to the bed.

“The real question,” he said, “is what do we do with ‘em?”

Jack shook his head. “I don’t know. I guess we’ll have time to stop by the nearest port next week. We'll have to skip part of our route but we can drop them off then.”

“Drop them off?” Crutchie asked. “Can’t they stay?”

“Stay? So we can, what? Have two more mouths to feed?”

Crutchie shrugged. “The kid might be good for morale. And they were both on the run, right? They’ve got to have _some_ kind of talent that might be useful.”

Jack considered it. Really, the boy before him didn’t look useful at all: he was thin and lanky, not built for hauling or junking. Maybe he’s got brain smarts, but they’ve already got Jojo and Race, the two smartest Junkies in the system.

There was something about him though, Jack thought as he studied the guy. The agitated way his brows furrowed at something deeper than the sickness, the soft lines of his face that did _not_ come from years of space. And the two of them did survive for a few weeks on nothing but scraps and still managed to remain undetected.

He thought about what Race had said, how the kid bravely defended his brother right up until they found him. That fierce loyalty could do something aboard this ship, at least to set an example.

“Jack. At least give them a chance to prove themselves,” Crutchie urged.

Jack sighed, and turned toward him. “You really think I should let them stay?”

His second, his friend, nodded determinedly. “I do.”

“Okay,” Jack said after a pause. “They can stay, at least until we make our next dock. That’s a couple of weeks.” He turned to Race. “He’ll need to sleep in the sick bay for a little longer. Can you find a place to put his brother?”

Race nodded. “On it.”

“Thanks. Come back to Deck once you’re done. We’re navigating the Harlem belt today, and I need your skills. Crutchie,” he said as Race dashed out. “Stay with him a little longer, see if you can find anything out. Anything you need to do that—prints, DNA, hair, whatever, you got it.”

Crutchie mock saluted. “Will do, boss.”

Jack allowed himself one last glance at the boy on the bed.

His skin was still a sickly yellow, and his breaths were still ragged, but his teeth were gritted in a sort of defiance Jack hadn’t seen before. He thought about the fire in the kid, Les’ eyes.

Something had happened to these too, and that something almost certainly spelled trouble. But Jack knew what trouble was—he had been in some shadowed corners before himself, and even in the darkest of times someone was still there to pull him out.

Maybe Jack could be that person for Davey. Maybe he could repay that good fortune.

After all, what goes around, comes around. And little did Jack know, he would be needing some good karma not very long from now.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I won't post super regularly, but you can check my tumblr for updates @they-think-they-got-us!
> 
> I hope you enjoy, and I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments! 
> 
> *The epigraphs for each chapter are from The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Elliot*


	2. The Harlem Belt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The minefield of asteroids turns out to have a few nasty surprises for the Junkies. Because of course it would.

 

_Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets_  

_And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes_  

_Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?_

 

* * *

 

 

“Hard to Starboard!” Jack shouted, gripping his armrests tightly. The rest of the Junkies jerked back as an asteroid slammed into the side of the _Manhattan._ “Race—“

“I know what I’m doing, Jack!” Race shot back, gritting his teeth and dragging back on the thrusters. The ship groaned as it turned sharply and narrowly avoided a large meteor hurtling right towards them.

“Sixty thousand kilometers to go!” Specs reported, bracing himself on the console. “Less than half a tank o’ fuel left.”

“We’ll never make it,” Albert moaned, clutching tightly against the wall as the ship rocked again.

“We’ll make it,” Jack promised. “Race, turn portside!”

“I’ve _got_ it, Jack!”

_Bam!_

“ _Race! Portside!”_

“ _I KNOW!”_

The Deck tilted steeply to the side before the gyro-stabilizers could rotate it back up, and Specs’ glasses flew by Jack’s head, narrowly missing him. “Shit, sorry Jack.”

“Don’t worry about it, Specs,” he said, pointing at Tommy Boy. “Can you help him?”

“On it.”

Jack settled back in his chair, nervously drumming his fingers against his palm. Race was a good-- _amazing_ even--pilot, but the Harlem Belt was infamous for it’s hard-to-see corners and solar winds that could reach up to 300 miles per hour, pulverizing objects to dust and sending others spinning off in the most unpredictable directions. Many ships were known to go in and never be heard from again. This was the third time the _Manhattan_ and its crew had to navigate through it, but they were far from experts and this was the worst Jack had seen the winds yet.

_Bam!_ Jack was thrown from his seat as a particularly nasty asteroid slammed into the hull of the ship and he hit the ground hard. Monitors lit up red, blaring chaotically above the shouts of the crew members.

“We’ve lost the reserve tank!” Tommy Boy shouted as loud as he could over the commotion.

At the controls, Race was sweating. His knuckles turned with as he gripped the levers even harder, throwing them back and forth into position. He had managed to stay upright, having the forethought to buckle himself to the dashboard before entering the field, and steered them out of the way of another projectile.

“Jack, the rocks--they’s coming at us from all sides! We won’t make it much further without shields!” Finch cried out.

Jack’s head whipped around toward Albert, but the Junkie shook his head furiously. “Shields are too damaged to use. We need to find a path out of here!”

“Race?!”

_“Will you fucking let me do my job--”_

The alarms blared even louder, and red light bathed the deck. Jack was now out of his seat, right in front of the window and he looked wildly out. What was once beautiful, glittering diamonds was now deadly knives, sharpened and poised to strike. Behind him, the crew scurried frantically about the deck, shutting off alarms as they popped up and racing for another.

The rocks were flying at them at 350 miles per hour, just a little more than what the old _Manhattan_ Junker ship was built for. And as Jack squinted, he could barely make out the Harlem Jetstream, the most dangerous part of the belt. Their ship was just hanging on by a thread, and the wort part hadn’t even hit yet.

“We’re not gonna make it,” Jack muttered in panic. “Race! Get us out! Now!”

“Jack, there’s no room, I can’t--!” The screen in front of him providing the map of the belt fell to static and Race let out a string of curses. “Sats out, I’m flying blind!”

_“Albert get those screens back up--”_

_“_ Jack get out of the way, I can’t see--”

“Tommy Boy, distance?!”

“Fifty eight thousand kilometers to go!”

_Bam!_ “Engine one is down!” _Bam!_ “Radio’s out!” _Bam!_ “Hull density is compromised!”

_“Race!”_

_“Jack!”_

_“Watch out--!”_

 

* * *

 

Crutchie woke up to the sound of a high-pitched continuous ringing in his ears and it pounded against the walls of his aching temple.

It didn’t take him long to realize that the ringing wasn’t in his head, but from the monitors next to Davey’s bed.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit--” he muttered, trying to make his way over to the bed--when he discovered he couldn’t move his legs.

Well. Not like he normally could, at least.

A pen floated past his head and as he reached for his crutch he realized he, too, was floating, suspended in the recycled air of the ship.

_We must have crashed,_ he thought dimly as he pushed himself off the wall and towards the hospital bed. _That’s why the gravity’s out._ Davey was hovering in the air as well slightly over his bed, still unconscious. Despite the panicking monitor, he seemed to be breathing, and as Crutchie got closer, he found the reason for the flatline was just that the cords had fallen out of the patient’s arm.

“You can sleep through anything, can’tcha?” Crutchie muttered as he pushed Davey back down towards the hospital bed and strapped him in. Fortunately, the bed was bolted to the floor and came with ties for just this occasion. He inserted an IV back into the guy’s arm, then hooked the monitors back up. “This’ll keep you alive in case something else bad happens.”

No response, of course, not even a ‘thank you Crutchie for saving my life,’ but then again he didn’t really expect one yet. He’ll come later to accept his praises, but right now, he needed to check on the Bridge.

 

Crutchie always liked zero-g better. Without the weight of gravity, he could move however he pleased. He wasn’t dragged down by his bum leg; in fact, in the air it just hovered out behind him like any other normal leg. In zero-g, he could move as swiftly as the other crewmates. In zero-g, he could do anything: flips and twirls and tricks and dancing in the air, just like everyone else, instead of sort of shuffling around.

But now wasn’t the time for playing around. Crutchie deftly pulled himself through the empty corridors of the _Manhattan,_ calling the name of just every Junkie he could think of--but he got no response at all.

The bunks, empty but messy, were full of floating projectiles that spilled out into the halls. He managed to skirt most of them, but he was caught in the stomach by one of Jojo’s medical books and once into the shoulder by Finch’s backup slingshot. He managed to stop a small bottle of rum, which he frowned at, and then pocketed, that floated out of Romeo’s room.

Small bits of clattering and crashing echoed through the metal as miscellaneous object floated straight into walls and bounced back, but a strange noise stopped him where he hovered.

“Jack?” he called down to the end of the hall. “That you? You okay?”

The strange noise sounded again, this time louder. It was a sort of pounding, irregular like, and it didn’t come from towards the Deck, but from one of the closed bunk rooms.

Was that a Junkie trapped in there? Crutchie quickly sailed toward it, reaching out for the door handle. He jumped back as something pounded from the other side again, but he took a deep breath, steeled himself, and yanked open the door.

 

* * *

 

Jack was… spiraling. Spiraling out into the dark of the stars, into the ocean of diamonds, spiraling into gold and silver and greens and blues and meadows and daisies and daffodils and…

_“Bet you can’t catch me, Jack!” His mom ran out into the wide open expanse of the field, petals and dandelion fluff soaring into the air around her. Jack giggled and ran toward her, his arms outstretched…_

_...Rain sprinkled from the sky, glittering beads of glass tinkling down onto the rooftop of their tiny shack and Jack turned his head toward the stars and opened his eyes as the water droplets landed on his face and dripped away like tears…_

_...the great city of Earth, full of people and laughter and chatter and tears and drunken shouts of joy, its metal spires piercing holes in the blanket of the night, Earth, his home, the one he was most desperate to leave…_

_Space wasn’t anything like it. Space was vast and black and so very empty of life that Jack just couldn’t bear it…_

He blinked his eyes open and was bathed in red.

The broken pieces of the Deck tossed and spun around him, knocking into walls and the unconscious bodies of Junkies. The blast-proof window had fortunately remained intact, though there was a considerable scratch down the side of it which would need to be repaired soon if they were to completely retain their oxygen supply.

Jack grabbed a pole as he floated by it and steadied himself. He felt down his torso and face for any injuries. Aside from general bruises and cuts from which he bleed in a few places, he wasn’t seriously harmed. He hoped the rest of his crew was just as lucky.

His eyes traveled down to the dashboard, where Race was still strapped in to it. He has a large, painful looking bruise by his eyes, but his eyes just barely fluttered open when Jack called his name, so he was alive at least.

“Hey, Race,” he called, his voice hoarse. “Race, wake up!” He pushed himself down towards the Junkie, and gently slapped him awake. “Race.”

Race’s head lolled on his shoulders, but he groaned and lifted it. “...Jack?” he muttered, dazedly.

“Hey, good you’re awake,” Jack said in relief. He began searching for the nearest floating Junkie he could catch.

“Wha’ happened?” Race groaned, blinking blearily. “We crash?”

“Yeah, we crashed,” Jack told him. “Looks like we’re all okay though. Think you could help get us going again?”

Race assessed the damage through his half-awake eyes, then shook his head. “Need Albert.”

Jack exhaled. “Okay, I’ll grab him.”

He pushed off the dashboard and floated through the room, rolling Junkies around as he passed by them. After ten minutes of searching, he finally found him with a gash in the arm but otherwise unharmed.

Once he was awake, Albert was able to power on the monitors again and get some readings.

“Well, Engine One, the radio, the satellite and the gravity simulator’s all still out, but we’ve still got enough fuel left to make it out of here once the winds die down,” he reported, typing away at his computer.

“Can you get any of it running again?”

Albert shook his head. “Not without stopping to pick up spare parts.”

Jack and Race worked to catch all the suspended Junkies and wake them up. Most of them were relatively okay, the worst extent of their injuries ranging to a couple of broken bones. It took longer to find Specs glasses, though. The pair were thin and small and seemed to shoot lightning fast across the whole Deck every time something bumped into them. It took four of them to corner the glasses, but eventually Finch managed to knock it towards Henry, who caught it just by the tips of his fingers.

Jack was just finishing up gathering all his shipment files (which would ensure they all got paid) when Specs’ voice rose in alarm.

“Uh, Jack?” he said, staring down at one of the few monitors Albert had managed to get working again.

“What is it, Specs?”

“Bad news. We’ve got company.”

 

* * *

 

Crutchie shrieked as a small person shot out of the bunk room and past him into the hallway.

“It’s you!” he gasped as the kid hit the wall upside down and rebounded slower back towards him. Crutchie grabbed his ankle before he could float away.

“Yeah, it’s me,” Les said obviously. “Who are you?”

Crutchie craned his neck to look at him. “I’m Crutchie. I’m the Captain’s right hand,” he added proudly.

“Right hand? I thought that was the Race guy,” the kid said. He was genuinely confused, but Crutchie still frowned at him.

“No way, I am. Race is just… he’s just a pilot.”

“What’s a pilot do?”

“Well, a pilot makes the ship run, steers it where the Captain wants it to go, helps the ship dock--” Crutchie cut off suddenly, his eyes narrowing.

“And what do you do?”

“You see, _I…_ I… help Jack when he needs me…?” He sounded unsure.

“So you’re more like the Captain’s servant?” The kid’s voice was starting to grate against Curtchie’s ears.

“You ask too many questions,” Crutchie chided, pulling Les down the hall behind him. “Come on, we need to go find Jack.”

 

* * *

 

Jack, at the moment, was freaking out.

A shadow had passed over the Deck, blotting out the stars. The giant metal of hull of the _SS Brooklyn_ filled the window, giving the whole crew an eyeful of the bright red letters on its side.

“Spot Conlon,” he said grimly.

“Oh man, Brooklyn’s here?” a Junkie asked nervously. “Jack, how’re we gonna get out of this one?”

“Well get out of it,” Jack responded, “Just follow my lead. Any volunteers for ambassadors? Finch?”

“Me? No way! That Spot Conlon’s... got me a little jittery.”

Jack sighed. “Fine. How about you, Mush?” Mush shook his head and promptly ducked behind his station.

“Elmer?”

“Don’t look at me! I’m not going nowhere _near_ that thing--!”

“Why is everybody so scared of Brooklyn?” A voice rang out behind Jack, and a hush settled over the crew as they all turned to look.

The voice belonged to the new guy, Davey the Stowaway, and he hovered by the door to the Deck.

Jack turned to look. The guy still seemed kind of pale, but he was upright and dressed and he even had the sense to put on a hat which miraculously stayed pinned to his hair in the zero-g. “You’re supposed to be getting better,” he said cautiously.

“I’m better,” Davey said tightly. “I was looking for Les, my brother. Imagine my surprise when I stumble on a whole deck of strangers in a ship with no gravity. Speaking of which, I have a few questions. Mainly, who are you guys? Where am I? What am I doing here? And what,” He pointed to the _Brooklyn,_ “the hell is that?”

Jack reached out a hand to steady him. “Look, it’s a long story. Why don’t you head back to the sick bay and--”

“No way,” Davey said firmly. “I’m staying until I find my brother.”

“We’ll help you find him, _later_ ,” Jack stressed. He was already tense, and neither this nor the _Brooklyn_ was helping. “I just can’t deal with another thing right now.”

Davey folded his arms and nodded towards the massive ship stretched across the window of the Deck. “Brooklyn,” he stated matter-of-factly.

“Yeah.”

“Know why they pulled you over?”

Jack shook his head. “Look, I really need you to just--”

“Cuz I do.” He stopped. Processed. Stared.

“How the hell do you know what _Brooklyn--”_

“I can help you, I can get you out of this if you give me my brother back,” Davey bargained.

“First of all, stop interrupting me. And second, what if I don’t believe you? No offense, but you don’t exactly look like the saving type.” Jack watched through narrowed eyes as Davey tried to formulate an answer to that. He didn’t have the time to negotiate, and his crew was already starting to get antsy. Mutters drifted throughout the vast Deck.

Jack sighed. “Davey--”

“We were running from Pulitzer.”

Jack froze. The mutters died out. “Pulitzer? The head of World Corporations?”

“That’s the one. He’s up to something, and _Brooklyn--”_ he gave a nod to the ship “--they know it. They probably picked up some kind of transmission about my brother and I, and that’s why they’re here.”

“We didn’t send out no transmission. How would they--?”

Race piped up. “Jack, Crutchie was researching them, remember? _Brooklyn_ could’ve picked up on the info requests.”

They all fell silent. Davey raised an eyebrow in anticipation. “Well?”

“Alright, alright, fine,” Jack said, pointing at Davey. “You help us with the _Brooklyn_ first, and then we’ll get you to your brother. Deal?” He spat on his hand and stretched it out. Davey recoiled.

“That’s disgusting,” he said.

“That’s the price of doing business,” Jack corrected, and waved at him. “You gonna shake or what?”

Reluctantly, Davey spat into his hand and took Jack’s. “Deal.”

They turned to face the hulking mass of the _Brooklyn,_ together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for those of you who have shown support for this fic so far! It's just starting to get off the ground, but I hope to be cramming some action and plot into these next few parts so stay tuned for more soon!


	3. The Brooklyn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack and Davey go to make a deal with the famous Spot Conlon and the Brooklyn crew. Meanwhile, Crutchie and Les struggle to find their way back to the Junkies.

_For I have known them all already, known them all:_

_Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,_

_I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;_

_I know the voices dying with a dying fall_

_Beneath the music from a farther room._

 

* * *

“Well that’s not good.”

Crutchie stared at the wall in front of him in disdain.

“Is there supposed to be a wall there?” Les asked behind him.

“Take a guess.” Crutchie pushed at it experimentally, but it was a thick piece of metal blocking their path, and he couldn’t get enough traction in the zero-g to even make it budge. He felt along the side of it, searching for any kind of cracks or lose bits, but it was solid all the way through. He sighed. “We’re going to have to go around.”

“Go around? How far is that?”

“Far,” Crutchie said grimly. “This is a big ship, and the only other way…” he turned to face the kid dramatically. “Is through outer space.”

Les’ eyes grew to the size of fish bowls. “For real?”

“Nah, I’m kidding,” Crutchie laughed. “There’s another path just down the next hall. Come on.”

The two of them made their way back through the bunk hallway and around the corner. The kid was still kind of annoying to Crutchie, but he had an endearing innocence to all his question-asking that almost reminded the Junkie of himself. He wondered just how a kid like him got to be this far out into deep space.

They pushed their way down the second hall, but stopped when they saw the dead end.

“Shit,” Crutchie cursed before he could stop himself, then quickly glanced at the kid.

He seemed unfazed. “Another wall?” he asked, crestfallen.

“Yeah. No worries though,” Crutchie said, trying to remain upbeat. “There’s one last path we can try.”

He turned back the way he came, but Les still sulked by the wall. “Are we ever gonna make it out of here?” he glumly said.

“Of course we will,” Crutchie said, a little uncomfortable with the kid’s dejection. He didn’t know how much the kid picked up on, or if he knew how bad the situation really was, or the importance that they really made it back to the Deck. He didn’t normally have to deal with children, especially not _sad_ children.

“Come on, let’s just check one more place and then I promise we’ll be safe.”

“Okay. When can I see Davey?”

Crutchie smiled, grateful for something to latch onto. “Not long. We actually have to pass back through the sick bay again, so you can see him there.”

That seemed to cheer the kid up, and before long, they were both moving quickly through the ship again.

 

* * *

 

“Junkies?” Davey asked, giving Jack a look. “You _are_ aware of how that sounds, right?”

The Captain cracked a grin. “That’s part of the fun of it. We pick up space junk and sell it, so: Junkies. Plus it’s always fun to see the look on people’s faces when we introduce ourselves.”

Davey shook his head. “You people are weird.”

“Hey, you stowaway onto _our ship,_ and still have the nerve to criticise us?”

“We’re not technically on your ship right now,” Davey pointed out.

He was right. The two of them were in a space elevator, attached to the _SS Brooklyn_ , and were currently suspended in space between that ship and theirs. The walls of the elevator were somewhat translucent, and they could just barely make out the hulking shape of the spaceship in the dark. It looked over them ominously, and Dave couldn’t help but tighten his grip on his seat belt.

“Oh, smart guy, aren’t you Davey?” Jack teased, noticing the guy’s tension. Davey shot him another look.

“Only Les calls me Davey,” he corrected. “My name is David.”

Jack tilted his head. “You look more like a Davey to me.”

“Yeah well,” Davey muttered. “I didn’t ask you.”

Jack frowned, searching the guy’s face. There was something about him that was troubled. He wasn’t entirely sure what brought the stowaway and his brother aboard his ship, but it wasn’t for shits and giggles. These boys were running from something real bad.  

“So what’s your deal?” Davey lifted his head. “You like, all broken bad boy or mysterious stranger?”

“Sorry?” the stowaway asked, a polite but confused smile playing across his face.

Jack shrugged. “All I’m saying is most space guys got some kinda gag. You know, a personality.”

Davey raised an eyebrow. “Then what’s yours?”

“Oh, I’m the handsome, charismatic space Captain of course.”

He laughed. “Yeah, right.”

“What you don’t agree?”

Davey blushed slightly and opened his mouth to fumble for an answer when he was cut off as the elevator jerked to a stop. They hadn’t reached any kind of gravity field yet, so when Jack unbuckled himself he gently floated into the air. He stretched his arms above his head and held a hand out to Davey.

“Come on, we’re here.”

“I’ve got it,” Davey muttered, undoing his clasp and bracing himself against the wall of the elevator. A fresh wave of nerves overtook the ones Jack had managed to wash away with his jokes, and he could feel the wall start to build inside him again.

It cracked a little when Jack retracted his hand with a hurt look on his face.

 

The door to the elevator slid open with a hiss of hydraulics, and the pair were greeted by a squad of high-tech military personnel. Jack steeled himself. He was prepared for this kind of greeting, especially after the last time his crew ran into _Brooklyn._

Spot Conlon was the mightiest leader in this whole galaxy. His military power was absolute, and he was well-known for being a fair, yet merciless General. Any ship that comes across his, their first move is turn to straight around and fly away as fast as possible. No one wanted or dared tangled with _Brooklyn._

So Jack was prepared. But he couldn’t help but notice Davey’s eyes flicker nervously to the semi-automatic guns. He hoped the guy could handle the pressure.

One soldier stepped forward, his chiseled face set seriously. “Welcome, Captain Jack Kelly and guest. We’ll need to search you for weapons if you don’t mind.”

He nodded, and two others moved toward Jack and Davey. They allowed them to pat them down awkwardly, and after Jack’s gun was taken from his belt, the soldiers moved up behind them. The leader relaxed and slung his gun around his shoulder, extending a hand.

“My name is Leo. We’ll take you to see General Conlon now.”

Davey and Jack exchanged glances. _‘Here we go,’_ Jack mouthed, and the two of them followed the soldiers into the unknown corridor.

 

* * *

 

“Fuck,” Crutchie swore at yet another hunk of metal that blocked their path. “Is there any place on this damn ship still intact?”

Les crouched down, trying to peer through a hole in the wall. He managed to see through with one eye. “I see the sick bay!”

“This must have fallen after I left,” Crutchie figured, gritting his teeth. He reeled back, pounded it hard with his fist in frustration, and went sailing backward.

Head over heels, he spun down the long hallway, and the dissociation was so unreal, so peaceful that he was almost tempted just to keep sailing away into the dark forever. In space, it was possible. In space, he could just… _let go._ The vacuum called to him.

“How are we gonna get through?” Les’ worried voice grounded him. “Isn’t that our way to the Deck?”

“Yeah,” Crutchie sighed, reluctantly catching a handhold and pulling himself upright. “Do you see anyone?”

The kid shook his head. “It’s empty.”

“Empty? Not even--” Crutchie stopped himself before he could finish his sentence. The brother was supposed to be in there. Was it possible he…?

No. Crutchie shook the thought out of his mind. Now wasn’t the time to worry about things he could do nothing about. He had to focus on getting him and Les back to the Deck.

But how could they get there? There were three, count ‘em, three different ways--which should have been more than enough--but it they seemed to be cornered. Trapped in every place possible.

Crutchie racked his brain. “Come on…” he muttered. “ _Think.”_

The ship was a maze of corridors and rooms. Almost all of them connected to another, but none of the rooms they could get to led portside, where the deck was. Even if they could _maybe_ get through to an unblocked hallway, they’d be on the opposite side of the ship than where they wanted to be. All the way over near the cargo doors.

He froze. The cargo doors.

The cargo doors...had _airlocks_. And so did the Deck.

He slowly spun to face the kid. “Hey Les?”

“Yeah?” came the innocent response.

“Remember when I joked that we’d have to fly through space to get around…?”

 

* * *

 

“Short,” Davey decided, the word blurting out before he could stop himself. Jack elbowed him. “Sorry.”

Spot Conlon, the Captain of the _SS Brooklyn,_ was tough, intimidating, muscular… and 5’4. That didn’t stop him from glowering up at Davey though, and as bulging muscles rippled, he quickly decided on a second impression: that General Conlon was _terrifying._

“Who are you?” he demanded, his eyes narrowed.

Jack stepped forward before Davey could say anything else. “I’m Captain Jack Kelly of the _SS Manhattan,_ and this is my friend--”

“Associate.”

“-- _Ungrateful passenger,_ Davey.”

Spot Conlon fixed Davey with a stare. “Jacobs?”

He nodded. “You’ve heard of me then?”

Conlon scoffed. “You could say that. You’re quite the story around here.”

Jack slowly turned to look at Davey with his face contorted in confusion. “You’re _famous?”_

Davey started to speak, but Spot cut in. “We appreciate your help in assisting us with the demolition of Hearst Station. Your contribution was very meaningful.”

Jack was now thoroughly at loss. The person next to him seemed more like a stranger now than ever. “You did w _hat?!”_  

But Davey just shrugged. “It wasn’t a big deal.”

_“Not a big deal--!”_

“Nonetheless,” Spot interrupted. “We are very grateful. If you ever need anything, don’t hesitate to call.” Davey nodded graciously. “But that is not why we’re here.”

Jack frowned. “It’s not?”

Conlon shook his head and sighed heavily. He raised one fist in the air and Davey jumped back as if he’d been burned.

“Jack--” he said anxiously, staring at something on the Captain’s chest. Jack slowly followed his gaze down to his torso, where eight red dots danced across his body, beady as spider’s eyes.

“What is this?” he said fearfully, pushing down a bubbling panic that was beginning to rise in his chest. _“What is this?!”_

“Though it pains me to do this,” Spot said grimly, “We are here for _you_ . Captain Jack Kelly, as General of the _SS Brooklyn_ and sworn officer of the law, I have been commanded to place you under arrest for trespassing and the illegal trafficking of goods.”

 

* * *

 

Race drummed his fingers nervously against the console which, surprisingly, was actually fairly hard to do in zero-g.

“Calm down,” Albert chastised from where he floated next to a monitor with a wrench. “There ain’t nothing you can do from here.”

“Something ain’t right, Al,” Race countered. “They should have been back by now.”

Albert shrugged. “Maybe they’re having a tea party.”

Race fixed him with a look, then began playing with a screen next to him. “Jack said he wanted to get in and get out. There’s no way he’d be staying there this long on purpose.”

“Maybe they’re just running long with negotiations,” Elmer piped up. “You know how these military people deal.”

Race didn’t answer that, instead he chose to duck his head and begin tapping away on his computer. Albert hung up his wrench.

“That’s right, you actually _do_ know,” he said, smacking his forehead. “I keep forgetting you served on the _Brooklyn.”_

“Race served on the _Brooklyn?!”_ Finch called from the other side of the Deck. Mutters rippled through the space.

“That’s what he just said, dumbass, pay attention,” Race snarked, then shot a pointed glare to Albert. “I used to. I don’t like to _talk_ about it though.”

Albert held up his hands. “Sorry.”

“So how long were you on it?” Tommy Boy eagerly asked, setting aside the loose bracket he was fiddling with. “Eight months? Twelve?”

“Three years,” Race answered reluctantly and a chorus of ‘ooo’s’ washed across the the room.  “Alright, alright, it wasn’t that big of a deal.”

“Why’d you leave?” Specs asked.

Race hesitated a bit longer on this one. “I couldn’t work with Conlon any longer.” The vagueness of his answer had a dishonest ring to it, but the look on Race’s face discouraged the crew from asking anymore questions.

They fell back into silence once more, Race tapping away on his computer, and Albert’s wrench squeaking against the bolt.

The Junkie banged a frame into place, reattached a couple of loose wiring, and finally, one more monitor was functioning. “Hey Specs, come over here and turn this on for me, will ya?”

“Sure,” Specs said, floating over to where Albert was. He long pressed on the power button, and typed in a series of passwords, followed by a voice recognition command.

Eventually the screen lit up a bright white, the World Corp. logo flashing across the front.

It was overcome with static for a moment or so, but the LEDs flickered blue, then red, then finally a nice bright green.

“We’ve got signal!” Specs cheered, and the rest of the crew joined in behind them, pumping their fists. “Let’s see if I can at least patch into nearby Com Systems…”

He fiddled with the dials for a few seconds more, and static burst over the loudspeakers overhead. The crew covered their ears in pain, but as Specs worked, the static faded and a voice could be heard deep in the din.

“Specs, can you tune in on that?”

“Working on it,” the Junkie said, his tongue locked between his teeth. “I think… there we go.”

The voice became clear, the familiar drone of local police dispatch. “We repeat, broadcasting on all open channels, we are searching for the fugitive Captain Jack Kelly and any nearby patrol ships are obligated to pick him up if spotted. He currently in charge of the rogue junker ship, the _SS Manhattan,_ and must be apprehended at all costs. We repeat, broadcasting on all open channels--”

The Deck was immediately engulfed by the outrage clamor of the Junkies.

“We ain’t rogue!” Henry shouted.

“We ain’t doing anything illegal, we’s just trying to survive!”

“Who the hell do they think they are, criticising Jack like that?!”

Race pushed away from the dashboard and shot back from where he worked, flying over to where the space gear hung.

“Race, where you going?” Albert shouted over the noise as the Junkie jammed on his helmet and stabbed at the elevator button.

“I knew something wasn’t right,” Race said grimly. “I’m going after Jack.”

“Race, wait!” Albert cried, but it was too late.

The elevator doors had closed with Race inside, and the last thing they saw was him pulling his gun out of his holster.

 

* * *

 

Crutchie tightened the buckle on Les’ harness. “That good?” The boy nodded, nervousness flitting across his face. “It’s gonna be okay. You’ll be attached to me the whole time. It’ll just be like a walk across the ship, except...in space.”

“I know what a space walk is,” Les said tersely. “I’m not that young.”

“Oh yeah?” Crutchie said as he began working on his own harness. It was difficult to put on himself, especially in zero-g and with a bum leg. “And how old are you?”

“I’m ten,” the boy said proudly, and he puffed up his chest, momentarily distracted.

“Really? I thought you were seven.”

“Hey!” Crutchie laughed good-naturedly, and he finally managed to lower his helmet down over his head. Finally, he took a long piece of rope, stretched it taught, and connected it to the two of them.

“This will keep you from floating away from me,” he explained as he hooked it onto Les with a carabiner clip.

“Like a leash?”

“Exactly like a leash. Come on, follow me.” The two of them floated into the airlock. “Now here’s how this is going to work. I’m going to scale alongside the ship--hopefully the solar winds have died down by now. I need you to stay as close to me as you can, okay? If you get tired, or need help, you can let go of the bars and reel yourself in next to me. The coms are still down, so it’s real important you watch me closely.”

The kid nodded, and Crutchie could only hope he was retaining as much information as he appeared to be. It was true, Les didn’t have the nerves of a first-time spacewalker, but he didn’t exactly have the confidence of a pro either.

“You ready?” Crutchie asked gently. He watched as the boy took a deep breath, then nodded with determination. “Here we go.”

He twisted the handle of the airlock, and pushed hard. Steam poured from the hydraulics as the doors slid closed behind them and latched shut. At Crutchie’s beckoning, the two began to move carefully down the airlock towards another set of doors. He twisted that handle and, with a somewhat resigned breath, pushed it too.

The doors slid open, and the bright starlight cascaded upon their face.

They were met with the endless expanse of the void of space, filled to overflowing with broken remnants of space rocks and glittering stars. It was black, blacker than anything man made, and was somehow enticing the way the asteroids of the belt swished and swirled in the dark ocean, glinting off each other like shards of glass.

Les’ eyes grew in wonder, and the twinkling lights were reflected in his small blue pools. Crutchie watched him rather fondly. He admitted it, the view was more than incredible. More than spectacular, it was undefinable. It was breathtaking. The first time he did a space walk, Jack practically had to drag him back into the airlock because Crutchie just couldn’t find the will to move. There was something about the sheer volume of nothingness that made your entire life feel… minute. You could waste away doing nothing but staring into the vastness of space, trying to comprehend matters far too great to even wrap your tiny mind around.

He suspected that’s how Les was feeling right now. Very, very small.

Crutchie let him have another second with the view before he tugged gently on the rope. _Come on._

There were maintenance ladders alongside the ship that they followed, moving hand over hand, one rung at a time. The movement was nearly effortless to Crutchie, though Les had to take a few breaks every now and then.

It took a long time, but eventually they nearly made it over the hull. The light faded behind them as they climbed up and around the belly of the ship and into a great--

Shadow.

A shadow covered the entire portside of the _Manhattan,_ looming and ominous. Crutchie froze where he was so quickly Les bumped into him.

 _What the hell is that?!_ Crutchie thought wildly. _What--_

With a great groaning of metal, the shadow shifted, rolling over to reveal the large red letters of the _SS Brooklyn._

 _Oh no._ What were _they_ doing here? Nothing good ever came from dealing with the _Brooklyn_ crew.

Les pawed at Crutchie’s suit and gestured toward the ship in an unspoken question. The Junkie shook his head, at a loss for an answer.

The ship continued to move, twisting the front around. As they watched, the _Brooklyn_ rolled to starboard--and suddenly a small metal object shot up from the _Manhattan._

Crutchie narrowed his eyes. A space elevator, from what he could tell. The elevator rocked up toward the Brooklyn, knocking loose asteroids out of its path as it went, and sending them hurtling toward--

 _Shit._ The asteroids bumped into larger ones, and those bumped into others, and soon the whole field was alive again, swarming like bees in a hive. Crutchie jumped as one slammed into the metal right next to his head.

Panicked, he swung his head down toward Les and made eye contact. _We need to go, now._

He tugged the kid up behind him and began climbing the ladder, skipping two or three at a time. The asteroids grew larger and more furious as the seconds stretched on, and soon Crutchie found himself trying to clear a path in the rubble. He knocked one out of the way, and felt a sudden jerk on the rope.

He turned, and immediately let out a violent string of curse words.

Les had been hit by an asteroid, and was now tumbling out further away from Crutchie. The rope wasn’t long, but it was stretched tight.

The Junkie reached to grab it and pull Les in, but he nearly lost his handle as an asteroid pounded the rung next to his hand.

He was trapped. He couldn’t move up any further without jeopardizing Les in the middle of an active asteroid belt, and he couldn’t get to Les without getting to a safer place.

He was, quite literally, stuck between a rock and a hard place.

In the middle of space.

Alone in the darkness and suddenly feeling very, very small.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ugh. That feeling when you want to write but don't actually want to go through the process of writing each individual word...  
> Anyways, hope you guys enjoy it! I'm actually really excited about the rest of this fic.


	4. The Confrontation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Race sneaks onto the Brooklyn to rescue Jack, a surprising mystery is revealed about Davey, and Crutchie must figure out a way to save both Les and himself before they get crushed by asteroids.

_And indeed there will be time_

_To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”_

_Time to turn back and descend the stairs_

 

* * *

 

Race pressed his back against the wall of the space elevator as the doors slid open, gripping his gun tightly. He had made sure to switch the setting to stun, which would do no more harm than firing a burst of concentrated air at his enemy, temporarily immobilizing them. He wasn’t here to start a war—he was here to rescue his friend. 

He heard the surprised mutter of the welcome wagon as they peered into what appeared to be an empty space elevator and waited, squeezing tighter against himself as the team slowly moved forward and inside the elevator. 

The first soldier stepped inside, his foot barely crossing the threshold when Race leaped out at him and with a deft kick to the groin, knocked him to the ground. He twisted the soldier around, bear-hugging him tight in front of his body and holding him up as a shield. 

The next to soldiers didn’t hesitate to fire at him, and before they had even realized what had just happened, they had landed two rounds into their comrade’s bulletproof vest. The kevlar seized beneath Race’s fingertips, useless now, so he quickly fired his gun twice and the two soldiers flew backward, slamming into the wall behind them, and sliding down it, motionless. 

Race dumped the soldier he was using to the floor and charged down the hallway. No doubt alarms would be sounding soon, but this ship was familiar territory, and he knew exactly where to hide so he wouldn’t be caught by passing guards. 

He hated to admit that this was all coming back to him so easily, the thrill of the adrenaline, the swift movements of long-practiced motions, they way his finger rested naturally on his trigger. He hated to say how much he  _ missed  _ this, being in the middle of the action, because he could never go back to it. The  _ Brooklyn,  _ a ship that used to be his home, was no longer anything more than an old friend, an ex, maybe. 

_ “No more fighting,”  _ Jack promised when he had first taken Race in.  _ “How’d you like to be a pilot?”  _

It sounded like an adventure, he had decided. One that would take him far from the military. It was just his luck he was back here so soon. 

_ ‘Okay, think,’  _ he told himself.  _ ‘Where would Jack be?’  _

The answer was clear. He’d be in the middle of everything: the Control room. 

Race waited as a team of guards moved past the corner where he hid, then quickly sprinted down the hallway and threw open a door. 

The platinum handle conformed to his fingers as it had done so many times long ago, and Race had to consciously force himself to keep moving as he stepped into the room. 

A storage closet, as clearly unused now as it had been was Race was on this ship. It was probably the oldest room on the ship, and the one that contained the most... _ memories _ .

He knew there was a back door out of this closet, one that would take him directly to the Control room. He knew, even though he wasn’t supposed to, because he had used it many times. 

Even with the lights off, Race was still able to navigate easily through the weird twists in turns of the room, around storage racks and boxes that laid empty on the ground. He tapped his finger against his gun in anticipation, the steady  _ clack  _ of plastic somehow reassuring until finally he reached the other hidden door. 

He pressed his ear close against it, trying to hear anything he could. 

“Listen,” Jack’s voice came from the other side of the door. Race exhaled a sigh of relief. Good, he was alive. “Maybe we could make a deal. I know my friend, Davey here, knows a lot about what Pulitzer’s up to.” 

“Don’t drag  _ me _ into this,” Davey hissed as Spot’s eyes flicked to him. “I’m not the one getting arrested.” 

“Alright fine,” Jack tried. “What about goods? The  _ Manhattan  _ may not seem like much, but we’re known to pick up a very valuable object from time to time. Anything good, it goes straight to you.” 

“I don’t have any need for your junk,” Spot replied apathetically. “On the other hand, it’s a court martial if I don’t deliver you to--” 

“To who?” Davey interrupted suddenly, a glimpse of illumination playing across his face. “Who gave this order?” 

“Dispatch,” Spot said simply. “That’s where all our orders come from.” 

“And who controls dispatch?” 

The General scoffed. “What do you mean who controls it? I suppose the orders come from the Solar Senate, but--” He stopped, understanding dawning on his face. “You think Pulitzer ordered this.” 

“What?” Jack cut in. “What’d I ever do to Pulitzer? Why’s he want  _ me?”  _

“Think about it,” Davey urged of Spot. “Jack’s a  _ junker.  _ They pick up lose or dumped space junk. And Pulitzer--” 

“--Dumps his unused parts into the Vegas Quadrant,” Spot finished, then turned to Jack. “Did you pick up there recently?” 

Jack nodded slowly. “Yeah, just a couple of days ago. You think I got something Pulitzer wants?” 

“It’s entirely possible,” Davey concluded. In the fluorescent light, his face began to pale. 

“But it’s still not certain,” Spot said, nodding at the two guards next to him. They moved to take Jack away. “I’m sorry, Captain, but that’s not a gamble I’m willing to take. I need to stay in the position I’m in if I’m to continue going after Pulitzer, and I’m not going to risk that for you.” 

Jack and Davey shouted protests, their voices overlapping each other and bouncing against the walls of the room, as Jack struggled against his restraints, and Davey moved to plea with Spot-- 

The sound of a gun cocking broke the din. Everyone froze. Spot slowly raised his hands in the air. 

“Don’t. Move,” Race hissed from behind the general, his gun digging into his neck. “Any of you!” 

Jack’s eyes narrowed, then widened as he saw who it was. “Race?” he asked in surprise. 

“Good to see you, Captain,” came the response. “Having fun?” 

He shrugged, lifting up his hands to reveal his shackles. “More or less.” 

“Race…” Spot finally managed, a crack in his voice revealing more than he would have liked.  He cleared his throat.

“Hey Spot,” Race answered, his tone light but forced. “You miss me?” 

“What are you doing here?” 

“Race works for me on the  _ Manhattan _ now,” Jack said, picking up on the tension between them. Next to him, Davey pressed a hand to his head.  

“You work for  _ him _ ?” asked Spot, trying to regain his composure. 

“What can I say?” Race shrugged, a bitter ring to his voice. “They’re more lax with the rules on a Junker ship.” That hit Spot hard, and though only his lips tightened, his grandeur presence seemed to shrink. 

“What do you want?” he asked thinly. 

“I want you to let Jack go,” Race answered simply. 

All eyes in the room were glued to them, watching the exchange like a ping pong match—except Davey, who was now swaying on his feet slightly and concentrating very hard on remaining conscious. 

“You know I can’t do that,” Spot stated, swallowing, then motioning again for his guards. They hesitated, then lowered their guns and began pulling Jack away again. 

“Spot, I swear to god, I  _ will  _ shoot you,” warned Race, his finger tapping against the gun. 

“No you won’t,” The General said coldly, but a bead of sweat rolled down his face. 

“I  _ will _ —“ 

“Jack?” Davey said suddenly, his voice thin and shaky. Everybody glanced over at him just as his face drained of color. “I don’t feel so good—“ 

He collapsed. 

“Davey!” Jack shouted, straining against his captors. “Let me  _ go!”  _

“What’s wrong with him?” Spot asked in alarm. Race lowered his gun slightly. 

“He was sick—look, Spot. Just give me time. I can prove it’s Pulitzer who warranted the arrest, and I’ll even help you find what he’s looking for. That’ll give you ground against him right? I can do that, but first, my friend is really sick and he needs a doctor,  _ now.”  _ Jack held his breath as Spot considered it. He knew it would be in the best interest for everyone if Davey were taken to the med bay. Spot didn’t know it was just a fever, he could be thinking he was contagious. 

Finally, the General nodded. “Release him,” he commanded, and the soldiers quickly unlocked Jack’s handcuffs. He sprinted over to the stowaway. Race lifted his gun away from the back of Spot’s neck and made a show of redoing the safety for everyone’s comfort. “Take them to the med bay. And don't let  _ him,”  _ he nodded to Jack, “out of your sights.”

 

The med bay, fortunately wasn’t a long walk from the Control room, and soon enough Davey was hooked up to multiple IVs and was undergoing tests by the  _ Brooklyn’s  _ resident medical officer, Doctor Smith. 

She nodded and hummed absently as she tapped away on her computer, occasionally poking at Davey or tapping on his forehead. 

Jack hovered by the bed, but Spot and Race stayed back by the doorway. 

“It  _ is  _ good to see you again,” Spot muttered, but was only answered with an eye roll. “It’s been a while.” 

“And who’s fault is that?” Race answered tersely. 

Spot awkwardly looked away, refusing to meet Race’s eyes. “The  _ Manhattan _ treating you well?” 

“I’m doing fine.” 

“Are you a... soldier?” 

Race pursed his lips. “A pilot.” 

“Oh. I see.” 

“What about Jack?” asked Spot with feigned apathy. 

“What  _ about  _ Jack?” 

“Are you two…” Spot hesitated. “Together?” 

Race shot him a glare. “ _ Friends _ .” 

“Sorry. It just seemed like you were very serious about protecting him.” 

“Yeah,” the Junkie said. “He saved my life. I owe him. Plus, he’s a damn good Captain. Fair,” he added pointedly. “Loyal.”

Spot sighed. “What I did… I was forced to do. I didn’t have a choice.” 

Race whirled on him. “You  _ did  _ have a choice!” he shouted suddenly, and Jack and the Doctor looked up from where they were talking. “Sorry,” he muttered to them, and went back to leaning on the door, his arms folded. 

“Race, I—“ 

“I would have shot you,” the Junkie interrupted. “I would have done it.” 

“I know,” Spot said quietly. “You mean what you say. I always admired that about you.” 

Though that didn’t make Race relax any bit, the following silence between them seemed a little less hostile. It would be a while before they trusted each other, and Race would probably never truly forgive Spot for what he did, but maybe they could at least get back to the point of grudging respect. 

“Oh dear,” the Doctor commented from where was was tapping away on her computer. The three of them straightened. 

“What’s wrong?” Jack asked anxiously. “Is he okay?” 

“Well he’s not dying,” the doc said flippantly. “But I do believe this is a bit more serious than the flu. You mentioned he woke up once your ship dropped to zero gravity, right?” Jack nodded. 

“You think it’s gravity poisoning,” Spot filled, frowning. The Doctor nodded, and Race visibly winced. 

Jack glanced between them, lost. “What’s gravity poisoning?” 

“It’s a term Doc Smith coined. She’s done studies on the soldiers of this ship,” Race supplied.

Spot nodded and finished, “The pressure the gravity simulators generate is sometimes too strong for certain people with more malnourished bones. People who have spent most of their time in zero-g.” 

Doctor Smith huffed. “Go ahead and steal my thunder, why don’t you?” 

“Sorry Doc.” 

“Anyways,” she continued, handing her tablet to Jack with a picture of Davey’s skeleton on it  “Your friend’s bones are severely malnourished. I’ve really only seen this level of decalcification in people who’ve worked their whole lives in the platinum mines.”  

Jack looked up at her, then down at Davey. “The platinum mines…” 

“That, or he could have been exposed to very high amounts of radiation, but that is much less likely. What you see here is the body’s attempt at distributing blood throughout the veins while it’s being forcibly pulled downwards. It sends the heart into overdrive and does all kinds of nasty stuff to the functioning of internal organs.”

Jack considered this. “Could a kid have this too?” 

“How old?” 

“Ten-ish.” 

The Doc nodded. “It’s very likely, although the signs wouldn't be noticeable until he reaches puberty, at least. That’s when the bones really begin to develop.” 

Jack crossed his arms and frowned. “Is there a cure?” 

Smith brightened. “Fortunately, I’ve been developing one for the soldiers who were recruited from the mines. I think it should work for your friend too.” She turned and began rummaging through her cabinets. 

Jack stared down at Davey, pale and shaking on the bed.  _ ‘What all have you been hiding?’  _ he wondered. He’d seen the platinum mines before. They were not a place for kids. Was it possible he and his brother were being forced to work, and they escaped? They didn’t look like the rough and dirty type, but if there was one thing Jack learned from commanding the  _ Manhattan _ , it was to never judge a book by its cover. 

“Here it is!” Smith popped out from a freezer with a syringe and a coupe of pull bottles. She set them down on a tray, and pulled off the top of the needle. She typed a command into the computer. “Disposable nanobots,” she explained. “These will reorient the brain to process the addition of gravity. They should do their work, then be flushed naturally out in a day or so. It’s rather fascinating, actually!” She slowly inserted the syringe into the back of his neck and drew it back out again. “Easy-peasy.” 

Next, she handed the bottles to Jack. “You just need to make sure he takes these once a day for at least three months. They’re calcium supplements, and they should get his bones back to full strength in no time.” 

“Thanks Doc,” Jack managed through his surprise. “Do you think I could get a few extra for his brother?” 

“You said he was ten, right?” She waved him off. “As long as he’s spending most of his time in gravity now, his body will be able to adjust without the use of medication. Kids are adaptable like that.” 

“O-okay,” Jack said. “When will Davey wake up?” 

“I’d give him a few hours. I’d like him to stay here for a bit so I can watch the nanobots do their thing. They are fascinating creatures!” 

“Perfect,” Spot said briskly. “That will give us plenty of time to negotiate, Jack. Join me in my office?”

 

* * *

 

_ “Les!”  _ Crutchie screamed, though without radios there was no way the kid could hear him. ‘ _ Shit,’ _ he thought, the rope nervously twined through his finger.  _ ‘What do I do? What would Jack do?’ _

He wildly looked back down towards Les, where he was busy dodging asteroids. Crutchie had to admit, the kid was nimble. He was able to squeeze between the large rocks almost effortlessly, but the obstacles just kept coming and he could tell he was starting to get tired.

_ ‘Come on, Crutchie!’  _ he implored himself.  _ ‘There’s a solution here, and you know it. You just have to find it!’  _

He looked back to where the elevator had rocketed across space. Asteroids still tumbled from the path in waves, and—actually... they  _ were _ waves. 

It was a chain reaction, a rock hit another, then that hit another, but it was all in a line. Like a sine wave, there was a moment of impact, then there was a moment of stillness before the next impact. If he could somehow manage to pull Les through at the moment of stillness, they might manage to make it without setting off another chain reaction. 

Crutchie gripped the rope tight in his hands. He couldn’t make eye contact with Les, and had no way to communicate what he was about to do. He could only hope that the child wouldn’t fight it when Crutchie pulled. 

_ ‘Okay, okay, here we go,’  _ he breathed to himself as he wrapped his good leg around a rung to brace himself and rotated his torso toward the kid. It was uncomfortable, but he pushed the thought out of his mind. There were more important things at stake than luxury. 

He turned his head toward the start of the wave and counted the time it took to reach Les. ‘ _ 15 seconds.’  _ He had fifteen seconds to pull the boy to safety. 

He could do this. He could do this. 

_ ‘Ready…’  _ he braced to pull.  _ ‘Ready…’  _ There was brief moment of stillness near the elevator and— 

“Now!” Crutchie shouted, and he yanked the rope with all his strength. Les shot through space like a bullet, his head whipping around and his mouth dropping open in surprise. Fortunately, the kid had the quick sense to tuck his arms and legs into a ball so he wouldn’t drag or hit any asteroids as he flew. 

The wave started again, and the loud crunching of rocks only spurred Crutchie to pull harder, and he did, yanking the rope hand over hand over hand— 

Les slammed into the metal next to him, and just barely grabbed onto a rung before he could float away. 

Crutchie let go of the rope and dropped his head back, exhaling in relief.  _ ‘Thank god,’  _ he sighed, then turned to the kid. 

“You okay?” he asked in concern. Les seemed to understand what he said, and though his eyes were wide in fear, he nodded shakily. Crutchie patted his back good naturedly and slowly turned back to the ladder 

_ ‘Let’s get this over with,’  _ he thought, and the two of them climbed into the shadow of the  _ Brooklyn.  _

 

* * *

 

Albert kicked at a loose screw and watched as it spun end over end through the silent deck, the metal glinting all the way to the other side, where it eventually knocked into Finch’s head. 

“Albert, will you knock it off?” he cried, rubbing his head in frustration. 

“ _ Sorry,”  _ Albert responded, crossing his arms. “I’m just anxious. It’s been an hour, and still no word from the  _ Brooklyn.  _ I just want to know if--” He stopped, not wanting to finish his sentence. The rest of Junkies filled it in in their heads, though. They were all thinking the same thing.  _ I just want to know if they’re still alive.  _

The crew mates of the  _ SS Manhattan  _ were closer than family, having been forced to rely on each other almost on a daily basis. In fact, the Junkies were really the only family they had--most of them were orphans, scrounging for food on a poor and broken planet when Jack found them and took them in. Most of them owed their lives to him, and those that didn’t… well, he had proved himself to them more than enough times. 

Crutchie held that same kind of status too, since he was one of the first crew members of the  _ Manhattan.  _ He was closest to Jack, and his cheery optimism even in the toughest of situations was endearing, when not a little annoying. He had that old bum leg, which he could easily use as an excuse to get out of work, but Crutchie put in as many hours as the rest of them--if not more--doing whatever he could to help out around the ship. Many of the Junkies’ first memories of the  _ Manhattan  _ was his warm smile, welcoming them in. 

But now, they were both missing. And so was Race. What would happen to the  _ Manhattan  _ if they were gone? The crew was more than capable of performing their individual tasks: Albert as the mechanic, Jojo as the medical officer, Specs as the technician, Mush as the cook, etcetera, but none of them were quite ready to take command. It just wouldn’t feel right. 

And so here was where the Junkies waited, in fearful anticipation, both craving and dreading any news at all, when they were interrupted by a sharp siren and the hiss of hydraulics. 

“What is that?” Specs shouted, as the Deck erupted into nervous chatter. “Is that the elevator?”

“Nah, the elevator don’t sound like that,” Finch said. “I think it’s the airlock!” 

“Airlock?” Elmer cut in. “Who’s out there?” 

The boys rushed to the window, craning their necks around to see if they could catch a glimpse through it. 

“It’s Crutchie!” Romeo finally shouted, and the Junkie’s cheered. 

“Well, let ‘em in already!” Albert said, pushing through and reaching for the airlock handle. He twisted and pulled out the release, and the doors slowly slid open. 

Crutchie and the stowaway boy shot through into the Deck, tumbling around for second before the crew grabbed them and held them steady. 

They yanked off their helmets. 

“What happened?” a Junkie asked, and the rest chimed in agreement. 

Crutchie exhaled in relief. “It’s a wild story,” he said. “I’ll tell you guys once I--” He stopped, his eyes narrowed, searching. 

“Where’s Jack?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the support, guys! I actually haven't been this excited about a fic in a while!


	5. The Battle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack and Race bargain for their freedom, but an unexpected surprise sends them all reeling.

_And would it have been worth it, after all,_

_Would it have been worth while,_

_After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,_

_After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—_

_And this, and so much more?—_

_Would it have been worth it?_

* * *

The air was thick with tension. Jack stared deep into the eyes of the beast, clutching tightly at his armrest and doing his very best not to fidget. One wrong move, and he was a goner. One wrong word, and he would very likely be tossed to the cold clammy jaws of space. His teeth clenched. It had been a while since he had stared at his oppressor like this. 

“Well?” he finally prompted, breaking the silence. “Do we have a deal?” 

Spot carefully unfolded his hands on his desk and splayed his fingers over a holographic screen, where a cluttered display of various charts and graphs hovered. “Just to be clear,” he said, “you and Jack will travel back down to the cargo bay and open it, where you will thoroughly search for any object out of the ordinary. Upon finding it, you will immediately send it back up, and your crew and ship will be released. If you don’t find it, my team will come down and apprehend your Captain and the _SS Manhattan_ will be property of the _Brooklyn._ If you attempt to run, or sabotage the deal in any way, the _Brooklyn_ will blow it to dust.” 

Race rolled his eyes. “Yeah. Isn’t that what we just said?” 

Jack held out a hand to shush him. “I think that’s pretty fair. Wouldn’t you agree, General Conlon?” 

Spot considered it, then nodded curtly. “I do. We have a deal.” 

Jack grinned, then spat into his hand. After a pause, Spot slowly did the same. “Pleasure doing business with ya.” 

Race relaxed back in his chair. “Now that _that’s_ over with, any way we can get some booze? I know you still have that stash of whisky under your desk, Spot.” 

Conlon pursed his lips. “You never were one to forego the alcohol,” he commented. Jack glanced back and forth between them, feeling very much like a third wheel. “But now isn’t the time to get drunk. I think it would be best for both of us that you left as soon as possible.” 

Race frowned. “Alright. Let’s get the show on the road then.” 

The General stood up and gestured toward the door. “After you.” 

They followed him down the hall and to the dock, which was, to say the least, massive. 

The large metal cavern stretched up further than the highest ceiling of the _Manhattan,_ and was filled from end to end with fighter ships, cargo ships, stealth crafts, and more. The farthest end of it was walled by a clear insulating gel that the ships could pass through as they needed, and through it they could see the underside of the _Manhattan_ from where they stood _._ Jack whistled. 

“Gotta get me one of these,” he commented, his voice echoing throughout the bay. 

Spot raised an eyebrow. “All you’d need is a couple billion credits.” 

“Or some big guns and a really fast ship, if you know what I mean,” Jack responded, winking. Spot just shook his head. 

“You can take one of our short range ships,” he said, pointing down to the second dock. “I assume you’ll be able to pilot it,” he said to Race. 

“Of course I can,” the Junkie replied, puffing up his chest. “I can pilot just about any damn ship in the universe.” 

The corner of Spot’s mouth flicked up almost seemingly with pride. “I don’t doubt it.” Race softened a little bit at his tone. 

“Okay,” Jack interrupted. “You’ll have to give us a bit to search our cargo. We were supposed to be docking in a day or two, so our bay is pretty much filled.” 

Spot nodded. “How long will you need?” 

“Maybe two, three hours tops.” 

“Not a minute longer. It’ll already seem suspicious that I’ve waited here this long.” The General gestured toward the ship. “Hurry.” 

Jack and Race turned and began sprinting down the stairs, pushing past soldiers who stopped and stared as they ran by. 

“You sure this is the right move, Jack?” Race asked as they ran. “If we don’t find anything…” 

“We’ll find something,” Jack promised. “I know Spot. He wouldn’t have let us search if he didn’t think we would.” 

“Yeah, I know Spot too,” Race countered. “Enough to know that he isn’t always right.” 

Jack turned to look at him as they ran. “We’ll find something,” he repeated determindley. “Just have some faith.” 

“Do you really think--” 

**_BAM!_**

An enormous explosion shook the whole bay, flickering the lights and catapulting loose objects clear across the cavern. Jack managed to grab onto the stair railing, but Race was not so lucky. He was launched over the side and somersaulted all the way down to the floor, striking his back against a railing as he fell, and slamming onto the floor with a sickening _thud._

“ _Race_!” Jack screamed as ear-splitting alarms began to sound. The boy on the floor was motionless. 

“What the hell was that?!” Spot shouted into his radio. “Someone tell me who openly fired in a missile in the middle of a goddamn asteroid field, and why!” 

Jack clutched onto the metal bar as another explosion rattled them. He looked out through the gel and inhaled sharply as he saw what had happened. 

“Someone fired on my _fucking_ _ship_!” he shouted in disbelief, watching as pieces of it ricocheted throughout the belt, sending asteroids hurtling in all directions. Flames quickly flared and then extinguished as they caught on the _Manhattan’s_ oxygen and ate it through. 

As the ship rolled over from the impact like a great beast, another spaceship was revealed behind it. Jack cursed. It was the _Weisel._ Meaning the ruthless Delancey brothers: Pulitzer’s bulldogs-for-hire. 

“Those idiots!” Spot yelled. “Don’t they know where they are?” 

Sure enough, the asteroid’s were sent spinning again and the whole belt was alive yet again, eager for another pounding on the _Manhattan._

“They don’t care,” Jack called back. “They’ll do anything to tear my ship apart!” 

Spot looked down at him for the first time, and blanched as he saw Race sprawled out on the ground. “Shit, Race--!” 

“I’ll get him!” Jack shouted. “You make them stop firing!” 

Spot hesitated, still pale, but as Jack waved harder at him and turned to go down the stairs, he managed to pull himself away and ran for the command deck.  

“Race,” Jack hissed as he reached him. “Race, come on. Look at me, Race!” 

The Junkie groaned and rolled his head to the side. He grunted in pain as he moved, but his eyes fluttered open. “...Jack?” 

“Hey man,” the Captain said in relief. “You gotta stop taking hits like this, Race.” 

“S’not like I want to,” the Junkie complained, wincing as Jack helped him sit up. “Frick-- _ow_.” 

“Anything broken?” Jack asked desperately, but Race shook his head. 

“I’ll have one hell of a bruise later, but I just got the wind knocked outta me. Gimme a minute,” he panted, holding a hand to his hip. He moaned as he grabbed Jack’s hand and pulled himself to a standing position.   
Jack waited as he caught his breath. “You good?” 

“Yeah,” Race finally said, straightening. “I’m good. Let’s go.”

 

* * *

  


Crutchie was just getting settled in with a nice chocolate bar when Elmer began screaming. 

_“We’ve got incoming!”_ he yelled as an alarm began to sound. “Two missiles, starboard!” 

Crutchie immediately shot forward. “The _Brooklyn?”_

Elmer shook his head. “The _Wiesel!”_

“What the hell are they doing here?!” Crutchie shouted, reaching out for the monitor. “Why would--” 

**_BAM!_**

The world exploded. The entire Deck was thrown to the side with gut-wrenching speed, and the crew was launched clear to the other side of it. Junkies slammed into the wall as it flew to meet them, banging on computers and dashboards alike. Multiple alarms were screaming, and the Deck was bathed in red. A fireball erupted in space, the light from it washing over the whole portside of the _Manhattan._

Crutchie tumbled end over end for a long few minutes before he managed to catch himself. “What just happened?!” he yelled, wildly checked for any breach in the hull. There wasn’t anything visible, but the crack in the window had been lengthened considerably. He caught Les as the kid floated by. 

“You okay?” he asked, raising his voice over the alarms. The boy nodded dazedly. 

“I’m fine,” he said, and grabbed onto the wall with Crutchie. 

Albert appeared next to them. “Oxygen levels have got to be cut by half now!” he reported. “You see that fire?” 

Crutchie nodded. “How much more can we take?” he asked over the noise of a smaller explosion that rocked the Deck.

Albert shook his head. “Not much! We need to get out of here, now!” 

Crutchie turned. “Mike! Ike!” he called, and the twins popped out from behind a loose chunk of metal. “Can we fly?!” 

“Engine one is still out!” Mike responded. 

“We won’t be able to get it working in time!” Ike added. 

Crutchie groaned. _Shit._ It was one problem after another. Would they ever make it out of this goddamn asteroid belt? He turned to Albert. 

“See if you can get the radio working,” he commanded. “Send a distress signal to the _Brooklyn._ Maybe Jack’ll hear it and convince them to help.” Albert nodded and sped off, nimbly dodging broken bits of walling. “Specs! You help him!” 

Crutchie bit his lip. What next? What else could he do? What else could they do… 

But fight? 

“Elmer, Finch, Romeo, Buttons, Henry, and Sniper!” he shouted, and one by one, the Junkies appeared. “Get to your battle stations! We need to hold them off until we fix the radio.” They all nodded, and shot away as well. Crutchie turned and pointed down below him at the dashboard.

“Mike and Ike, you come to the controls. Roll over starboard so we can get a clear shot for the gunners.” 

“What should I do?” Les asked. Crutchie pulled him close and ruffled his hair. 

“You ready to pull your weight, kid?” he asked fondly. The boy nodded. “Good. Follow Tommy Boy. He’ll take to you the machine guns and help you.” Crutchie motioned Tommy Boy over and Les off to him. “Watch out for him, okay?” 

“You got it,” Tommy Boy responded, and started out of the Deck, Les close behind him. 

Finally, “Jojo and Mush, I need you two to go down to the cargo bay. You won’t be able to get through, but make sure the corridors are sealed off. We don’t want our oxygen supply draining before we get rescued.” The Junkies nodded and flew off, leaving Crutchie alone on the Deck with only Mike and Ike. 

A satisfied weight settled over him. He realized he didn’t exactly mind the way the crew followed his orders, and he didn’t exactly mind giving them. They would get out of this, they _would,_ and it would be because of him. 

“Am I still not Jack’s right hand man, Les?” he muttered as he stared at the the shadow of the _Brooklyn._ He bit his lip. “Jack… we need help.”

 

* * *

  


Jack slid into the Control room with Race, catching himself on an overturned desk. Spot was at the front, shouting orders as fast as he could. Soldiers scurried about like ants, and the two practically had to leap out of their way. 

Race and Jack joined the General at the front. “What do we do?” Jack asked desperately. “My ship’s getting torn apart!” 

“I can’t do much,” Spot said tensely, and both Race and Jack opened their mouths to protest. “This is Pulitzer we’re talking about. If I fire on one of his ships--” 

“If you don’t, you’ll be allowing a _massacre!”_ Jack argued. “That’s my _people_ out there! You have to do something!” 

“I _can’t!”_ Spot roared. “You don’t understand my position--!”   
“We understand your position just fine, _General,”_ Race spat. “You’re running away, you _coward!”_

“I can’t fire on the _Wiesel._ I can’t,” Spot shot back. “To do so would be jeopardizing more than just one old Junking ship. It would be putting my whole agenda against Pulitzer in danger. Race, I thought you, of all people would understand.” Race pulled back, disgust across his face. 

“I understand plenty,” he said coldly. “You don’t care about us at all.” 

Jack pleaded to Spot, “You got to do _something.”_

“What would you have me do?” Spot asked through a clenched jaw. “How could I possibly help you from here?” 

Jack opened his mouth to shoot back, but he was cut off as a soldier rushed in. 

“Sir!” he shouted. “We’re receiving a mayday from the _Manhattan!”_ _  
_ “What are they saying?” asked Jack instantly. The soldier didn’t even so much as acknowledge him, but at Spot’s nod, he continued. 

“They reported that they’re losing oxygen fast, and they don’t have the power to get away. They’re heading to their battle stations and have asked for backup.” 

Jack whirled on Spot. “How can you turn your back on them? You’re supposed to serve the _people_ of the _Universe,_ not some--some old man with deep pockets!” 

“For the last time,” Spot gritted. “I _can’t fire on--”_

“A leash,” Race interrupted suddenly, and the two turned towards him. “You can’t fire on the Delancey’s, but you _can_ help the _Manhattan_ escape. Just say you were concerned about your close proximity to the shooting, and tried to leave when the _Manhattan_ attached itself to you and hitched a ride out.” 

Jack nodded slowly. “We all get out of this belt, and Spot gets to keep his cover story.” 

“It could work,” the General said, glancing to Race with a small, appraising smile. “Alright, I’m in. Let’s do it.”

 

* * *

  


“.... _Manhattan, come in. This is the SS Brooklyn paging the SS Manhattan. Is anybody there? Over. Repeat, this is the--sir, sir, you can’t--...Crutchie! Pick up the damn radio!”_

Albert shot onto the Deck and tossed the fixed radio to Crutchie. 

_“Oh yeah, over.”_

He caught it and quickly long pressed the call button. “This is the _Manhattan._ Jack! Is that you?” 

_“Crutchie! Thank god, okay listen up. We’ve got a plan--”_ The line was overcome with static as another explosion rocked the ship. Crutchie swore very loudly and ducked underneath a rogue flying chair. 

“Hull density percent is at 15%, boss!” Albert reported as he moved back to his position at the monitor. “We ain’t got much longer!” 

Crutchie turned back into the radio. “It better be a good plan, Jack. We’re getting pounded out here!” 

_“Yeah, yeah, listen. We need you too--”_

 _BOOM!_ The sound of the _Manhattan’s_ air cannon broke through the alarms and the static, followed by the sharp hiss of the gunner’s lasers and Crutchie’s heart swelled at the sight of the _Wiesel_ being forced back a couple hundred kilometers. 

“Yeah!” he and Albert cheered. Mike and Ike high-fived each other down at the controls. “Jack, you seeing this? That’s your boys! That’s your boys, Jack!” 

_“Nice shot!”_ came the response. _“But Crutchie, we’re gonna get you guys out, okay? You guys know how to attach a leash?”_

“A leash?” Crutchie asked, distracted as another wave of projectiles were launched toward the _Wiesel._ “Yeah, me and Albert can take care of it. To the _Brooklyn?”_

 _“Yeah! Alright, how long do you think it will take?”_

Another explosion hit the ship--one that _didn’t_ come from their side. 

“13%, Crutchie!” Albert shouted. “And falling!” 

Crutchie radioed, “We’ve got maybe ten minutes at most left of this. Think you’ll be ready by then?” 

_“We’ll be ready. Radio when you’re attached!”_ The radio fell to static again. 

“You hear that, Albert?” Crutchie called. “You, Mike, and Ike work on throwing a leash. I’ll take over the controls.” 

“You got it,” Albert responded, and gestured for the twins to come and help him. 

A cosmic leash was a risky maneuver, they all knew that. When a ship flies so close that it latches onto another’s gravity and magnetic fields, there were a million things that could go wrong. Crutchie didn’t really understand the science behind it all, but from the sound of it, the two ships would be bound together at least until they reached the end of the asteroid belt. The _Manhattan_ would be completely at the mercy of the crew of the _Brooklyn_ as it would be dragged alongside it much like a dog unwilling to walk. Once they were locked in, all they could do was hope the _Brooklyn_ could navigate them all to safety. 

That, and kick some Delancey _ass._ Yet another round of _Manhattan’s_ lasers pummeled into the _Wiesel,_ and Crutchie could practically hear the two brothers cursing, those good-for-nothing thugs.  

“You get ‘em, fellas!” he applauded. 

“We’re attached!” Mike shouted over to him, and Crutchie immediately picked up the radio. 

“We’re ready, Jack!” 

_“Roger that! Hang on tight, boys!”_

“Strap into something!” Crutchie called to the mechanics as he buckled himself into the Captain’s chair. They quickly latched themselves into the emergency harnesses, just as the ship lurched hard starboard. 

Slowly, the _Manhattan_ began to move, trailing close behind the _Brooklyn_ through the belt. The Deck bucked and rattled as it collided with stray asteroids and grinded against the side of the _Brooklyn_ , but the next shot from the _Wiesel_ missed, and so did the next, and soon they were out of range of nearly every shot. Crutchie grinned and gripped his seatbelt as he watched in satisfaction the sight of the belt closing behind them and trapping the enemy ship in a minefield of rocks and empty cannon shells. 

“Yeah!” the three of them cheered, and the roar was picked up all the way down the hall to the gunner decks. The whole ship was filled with the din of their celebration, so loud that they must have heard it all the way on the _Brooklyn._

They had made it out.

 

* * *

  


“Yes!” Jack pumped his fist into the air and grabbed at Race. “We’re out!” 

“About goddamn time!” Race laughed, a grin splitting his face from ear to ear. “We did it!” 

“ _You_ did it,” Jack corrected, slapping him on the shoulder. “It was your idea.” 

Spot nodded. “Good thinking, Race.” The Junkie froze at his praise, but slowly he relaxed and a smaller smile burst from his face. 

“Thanks Spot,” he said genuinely, and the ice between them melted just a bit. 

The General nodded. “You deserve it. It was a good plan.” Jack patted Race on the back, and the Junkie winced, still laughing good-naturedly. 

“Well,” Jack said. “I guess we’ll be getting back to our ship.” 

Spot frowned. “Just a minute. We still need to figure out what Pulitzer--” 

“Sir!” an agent suddenly called from his desk. “The _Refuge_ caught on to our location, and is requesting parlay!” 

The grin fell slowly from Race’s face, and Spot drew up his shoulders. “General Snyder,” he said darkly. The _Refuge_ was the York galaxy’s local prison ship, famous for its sheer size and number of crew. The commander of it, Snyder, was a large, rotund man with a sharp appetite for abuse. Many of Jack’s crew had been on board it at least once or twice, and the stories were never pretty. 

“What? No, no, no, _come on!”_ Jack said, pounding his fist into the nearby wall. “Can’t we just be off the hook for _one goddamn second?!”_

“They’ll want the _Manhattan,_ no doubt,” Spot said. “Snyder was one of the first military officer’s to be drafted by Pulitzer. Who knows how much money he’s pocketing from this bounty mission.” 

“What the hell does Pulitzer _want_?!” Jack scowled. “If something was so valuable to him, he shouldn’t have fucking _dumped_ it!” 

Race’s face was grim, his bright smile completely effaced. “He won’t stop chasing us until he finds it, will he?” 

Spot met his eyes, and for the second time that day, they were wide with vulnerability. They were still that dark brown, Race noticed dimly, the kind that could open up and swallow him whole. The kind with a depth so tremendous he could get lost in them. Race remembered when those eyes were comforting, familiar, magnetizing even. He missed the day when those eyes belonged to someone he loved. 

As Race watched, something fiery churned deep inside those eyes, then melted into a hard steel. 

“Dump our reserve fuel,” Spot suddenly commanded to the agent. “Release it all.” 

“What?” Jack and Race said in unison, drawn back in shock. 

Spot turned to them. “You two need to get your friend and get back to your ship. Once you release the leash, we’ll make a full-thruster stop. That should slingshot you far enough away. The cloud of our fuel reserves should shield you from Snyder’s radar as you escape.” 

“Spot…” Race began, but the General waved them away. 

“You need to go quickly! Take the ship I showed you earlier. That should fit three people, and you know where the med bay is, Race.” 

Jack nodded to the General with respect. “Thank you, sir.” Then he turned and ran out of the Control room, calling over his shoulder, “Race, I’ll meet you at the ship!” 

Race lingered, wildly searching the General’s face. “They won’t let you go this time,” he said lowly, stepping closer. His icy blue eyes were wide with worry, and they were so innocent. Spot, too, missed the day when those eyes belonged to him.  

He slowly reached out to touch Race, but he hesitated and withdrew it, instead clasping both hands behind his back. “I’ll never be able to make up for what I did to you… to _us._ Maybe, at least, this will make some kind of amends.” Race’s face deepend with concern, and Spot forced himself to keep his composure. “But… I need you to do something. Once you make it out of here, you have to find Katherine.”

“Katherine?” Race asked, confusion playing across his darting eyes. Spot nodded once. 

“You’ll know her when you see her. Now hurry up, so my sacrifice isn’t in vain.”  

Race bit his lip. “Be careful,” he said hesitantly. “And thank you, Spot.” 

And then he turned and ran out the door without a second glance. 

  


* * *

  


From afar, the Harlem belt seemed small and insignificant. It was only when a ship entered that the 300 mile per hour winds and deadly sharp rocks became evident. It was only when a crew dared to plunge into the depth of the asteroids that they could see the remnants of old, rusted ships, long retired. It was only then that the stars seemed brighter on the outside, and they were reminded just how truly terrifying and powerful the force of space could be. 

Jack and Race met up in the empty bay of the _Brooklyn,_ and Davey was slung into the backseat with Jack. Race hopped in the front.

Crutchie leaped out of his chair and toward the airlock as he saw the approaching ship and knew instantly that it was Captain Jack Kelly returning home to his crew. 

Davey was unloaded and immediately taken to the sick bay, which Jojo had set back in order. He woke up not thirty minutes after being reintroduced to zero-gravity, and his first words were ‘where’s my brother?’ 

Jack watched with a fond smile from the doorway as siblings were reunited, and Les bombarded Davey with stories of his adventures, including when he got to shoot a massive air cannon with the help of Tommy Boy and ‘totally blew the bad guys to pieces!’ 

They all strapped themselves in as the _Brooklyn_ came to a sudden full-thruster stop and launched the _Manhattan_ far away like a slingshot. The cheers were deafening as they finally, _finally_ made it to safety. The repairs could be saved until later, it was decided, and for now they were going to celebrate with some _major_ booze. 

All but one were drunk instantly. Race floated in a hospital bed by himself, staring out the window at the receding shape of the _Brooklyn_ into the darkness as it was slowly surrounded by military ships. 

The Harlem belt was dangerous and deadly. But the cold vacuum of space was even more merciless, and the crew of the _Manhattan_ had just plunged head-first into the depths of it. 

They weren’t out of the woods yet.

 

 **END OF PART 1**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoo! Thanks everyone so much for the kudos and the comments, they really mean a lot!  
> I still plan to stick to my daily schedule (hopefully) for the second part, but you can always check my tumblr @they-think-they-got-us if I'm running behind.  
> Looking back, I realize there was quite a lot of Sprace in this part, so hang on Javid fans! There will be more to come ;)


	6. Sky Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some backstories are revealed *wiggles eyebrows*

“Ladies and--well, mostly gentlemen! May I present to you our most fearless crew mate yet! Make way for Smalls!” Sniper whooped, raising his and Small’s fist clasped together in the air.  _ “She slept through the whole goddamn battle!”  _

The Junkies cheered and laughed, bursting into applause. They tumbled in the zero-gravity, some trying to get to the pair, some accidentally bumping into objects and drunkenly soaring the wrong way, and yet others just cheering where they floated, stuck with nothing to push themselves with. 

Smalls sheepishly accepted the celebration and a bottle of beer, which she good-naturedly knocked back. She coughed. 

“So, you at least get over that cold yet?” Sniper asked, laughing. 

“Just barely,” she smiled. “The spacewalk didn’t exactly help though.” 

“Yeah, we really need to get our corridors opened again so we can get to our bunks without crawling across the outer side of the ship.” 

“Aw, what you complaining about?” Finch cut in. “Me? I personally  _ love  _ waking up upside down in the air, with my face in someone’s floating ass!” 

“We know you do, Finch!” Tommy Boy laughed, and Finch grabbed a loose screw nearby and chucked it at him. Tommy Boy rolled out of the way, and came back up giggling. 

Specs chimed in, “At least Hot Shot ain’t with us anymore, remember? He slept  _ naked!”  _

Romeo wolf whistled. “Oh yeah, Specs? How you know?” 

“Only reporting what you told me!” They dissolved into hysterics. 

Sniper and Smalls exchanged knowing glances. Out of all the people on the Deck, they were probably the only ones who knew the truth about everybody. They especially heard countless stories about what had happened with Hot Shot. He was kind of…. A playboy, to put the lightest. 

The thing about humanity’s explosion into space was this: all of mankind realized that their petty squabbles were  _ meaningless.  _ Fights about race, gender, sexuality, they were all shoved to the side in favor of mineral mining and exploration. In space, anybody could be whatever they wanted, with whomever they wanted. They had even stumbled across a group of trans- _ species _ once or twice. The new universe was so large that it was nearly impossible to find someone who actually gave a shit--and quite a few people took some liberties with that. 

Speaking of which, “Where’s Race?” Smalls asked with a frown. “He’s usually right in the middle of all the partying.” 

Sniper shrugged. “I think he’s in the sick bay. Jojo won’t let him out.” 

Smalls sighed. “Jojo is taking his position seriously, isn’t he?” Sniper nodded. 

Hot Shot used to be the unofficial resident Medical officer of the  _ Manhattan,  _ and when he left, they had no one to fill in the spot. Jojo, ever the dedicated student, took it upon himself to read all of Shot’s old medical books and take over for him. He was  _ amazing  _ at it, but sometimes his strict regard for medical rules got to be a little stifling. Many Junkies could recall a time when the rest of the crew was out partying while Jojo forced them to stay in bed and rest. Of course, it was for the best, and they recovered that much quicker--but if there was one thing Junkies didn’t like, it was missing out on the alcohol. 

Smalls sighed. “I feel bad for Race. I know a thing or two about missing out. Maybe I’ll stop by to see him later.” 

“I think Jack’s in there with him now,” Sniper said. “But yeah, I’d come with you.” 

“Hey, hey, you two!” Romeo shouted at them, interrupting their conversation. He sent two unopened cans of beer their way. “Catch up!” 

They caught it and exchanged glances. “Cheers,” Smalls said with a shrug, and together they chugged it as the Junkies cheered behind them.

 

* * *

 

“You lied to me.” 

“Which time?” 

Jack joined Race at the window of the sick bay and lightly pushed his shoulder. “Two broken rib bones, a sprained ankle and a mild concussion,” he rattled off, listing on his fingers. “And I distinctly remember you saying nothing was broken.” 

Race gave him a small smile. “Course I didn’t. I’m a tough guy. Couldn’t have you crying over me in the middle of a warzone, now could I?” 

Jack laughed. “What makes you think I’d cry over you?” 

“Oh please. I’ve seen you crying over those old soap operas more than a few times.” 

Jack pouted, offended. “Hey, those are good!” he protested, and Race snickered. 

“Sure, Jack.” 

They settled into an easy silence, both of them watching out the clear window at the empty space. It was so empty out here, away from the asteroid belt. All there was were stars and darkness. It was a little nauseating, the thought that they were alone for hundreds of thousands of miles. They still had some major repairs to make, and it wouldn’t be long before they needed to re-fill up on oxygen. 

But Jack let the boys have their fun. It wasn’t often they had something to truly celebrate, after all. They’d be able to work later. 

“So…” he started, glancing at Race out of the corner of his eye. “How are you and Spot?” 

Race shook his head. “Really Jack? Now?” 

“Hey, I’m just asking as a worried friend. I noticed a little bit of tension between you two.” 

Race didn’t answer at first. Instead, the lids of his blue eyes drooped slightly, and he ran a hand through his hair. For the first time, Jack noticed how tired he looked. 

“How much do you know about us?” he eventually said. 

“Not much. You never really told me anything.” Jack winced. He hadn’t meant to sound so accusing. Fortunately though, Race didn’t seem to notice. 

Race sighed. “It’s a long story.” 

“I have a lot of time.” 

“Well. Alright then…”

 

* * *

 

Race stood up even straighter as the General skimmed his cold eyes over him.

“New recruit?” he asked briskly. Race saluted. 

“Yes sir!” 

“Got a name?” 

“Lieutenant Racetrack Higgins, sir!” 

The General raised an eyebrow. “That’s quite a mouthful, Lieutenant.” 

“Yes sir!” 

He shook his head. “Alright. Well, you’ll be bunking on the top deck, with the other Officers. You can go get settled, then meet me in my office for a briefing.” 

“Yes sir!” Race snapped another salute and stood at attention until he was sure the General had turned his back. He watched him go. There was something striking about him, the way he carried himself, and though Race was the one looking down at him, he was still intimidating as hell. 

He liked that...

  
  


...An explosion rocked the side of the ship, and Race was thrown to the side. The General caught him by the collar before he could hit the ground and pulled him upright. 

“We’re under attack!” he shouted as the sirens wailed. “You soldiers get to your battle stations. Lieutenant Higgins, with me!” 

Race nodded and took off after the General, down the twisting corridors he had just started to learn his way around, and into the Control room. 

Bright blue screens covered the wall, and Race had to blink a few times before his eyes could adjust. By the time he had composed himself, the General was already down right in the center of it all, commanding and almost imposing. He couldn’t help but pause for a moment and stare at the captivating way he twisted and  _ danced,  _ really as he dealt out orders, like a spider at the middle of an intricate and gleaming web. But as explosions sounded in the distance, Race hurried to join him. 

“Who’s firing on us?” he asked, bracing himself against a deck as the ship tossed again. 

The General shook his head. “There’s a rogue pirate ship. We cornered them, and they’ve started to fight back.” 

Race groaned. It was always the goddamn pirates. They were such a nuisance, so full of bravado to think they could take on the full force of a military ship like the  _ Brooklyn.  _

“What do you think?” the General asked, and Race jerked to attention. 

“Sir?” he asked in confusion. Generals don’t ask  _ Lieutenants  _ their opinion. 

“It’s a test,” the General filled in, and turned to him. “What should we do now, Higgins?” He motioned for Race to take his place in front of the screens. After a brief hesitation, Race tentatively stepped forward and began scanning.  _ It was a test…  _ which had to mean there was more to the situation than he had thought. The General was trying to see if Race could figure out what else was happening. 

His eyes flickered across the boards, reading star charts, thermal readings, radiation readings and cold scans. The pirate ship was small, he noticed, smaller than what they usually came across. And the cannons were in the wrong place. Normally they were starboard, but this ship was facing portside. And their firepower was far too great for a normal pirate ship, especially one of that size. So either this was a new strain of pirates, or… 

“It’s not a pirate ship,” Race muttered, then whirled to the General. “It’s not a pirate ship, it’s a  _ scouting  _ ship!” 

General Conlon nodded, a pleased look flickering across his face. “Good. What do we do, then?” 

“Cease our firing,” Race said confidently. “Hail them with our colors and ask them to identify themselves. They’ll either respond with their origin, or keep firing and officially declare war on the  _ Brooklyn.”  _

“Very good,” the General said, and Race broke into a proud smile, swelling at the complement. “Go ahead and do it.” 

Race froze. “Me, sir?” 

“Yes, you.” 

“Alright--um, yes sir.” Race went over to the console and flicked on the radio. He hailed the scouting ship, and explained their position. He waited anxiously, but within minutes they got a reply. The scout ship was from the Albany galaxy, and they had gotten trapped in a nebula storm on their way out. Their radars had been jammed, and assumed that the  _ Brooklyn  _ was attempting to apprehend them. Eventually they were able to make out a treaty, and the  _ Brooklyn  _ offered to escort them back to the Albany galaxy where the ship could make repairs. 

The whole time Race could feel the General’s stare on the back of his neck, sending shivers down his spine, and when he turned, he met a pair of deep brown eyes, full of mystery and kindness and something new Race had never seen before. 

He really couldn’t get enough of it…

 

...Spot and Race slowly grew closer over the years they spent together on the  _ Brooklyn.  _ They just worked so well together, their thoughts in tandem. They would complete each other’s sentences, smile at the same things, and the whole time, the General continued to give Race the opportunity to take charge of the  _ Brooklyn  _ on some missions _.  _ Time after time, Race proved himself and, time after time, the General rewarding him with that approving smile.  __

One night after a particularly intense battle, General Conlon called Race into his office. 

“You wanted to see me, sir?” he asked, cautiously walking into the room. They had just chased down and apprehended a Junker ship that was known for facilitating black market deals. It was a tough fight. Eventually they had managed to subdue the criminals, but the  _ Brooklyn  _ had lost multiple fighter pilots in the battle.

It was a battle Race had led, and he couldn’t help but blame himself for the loss of the soldiers. 

The General turned. “Sit down,” he gestured. Race slowly sat, fidgeting with his hands in his lap. He prepared himself for a lecture. 

But instead of giving a long winded speech, General Conlon reached into his desk and pulled out a bottle whiskey and two glasses. He poured, took one for himself and slid the other to Race. 

“Sir?” he asked, rightfully confused. He glanced down at the amber liquid, sloshing in its cup. Spot took off his hat and sat down in his chair, casually leaning back and taking a sip. 

“When I was a Lieutenant,” he started, and when it became clear he wasn’t about to chew Race out, he took his glass as well. “My boss let me take charge of a few missions. I was fairly good at it, having minimal training, and soon I began to move up the ranks. I was the youngest Lieutenant in the fleet. I was taking over more missions as he grew busier with more important matters than small skirmishes. I grew cocky. Without his close supervision, and my range of successes, I grew reckless. I didn’t use our resources properly. I started unnecessary fights. Until one day, we came across a ship from another galaxy trespassing. I didn’t even try to be diplomatic, I just fired on them. Turns out, it was an ambassador ship.” 

Race said nothing, only taking a sip of his drink in an attempt to hide his surprise. The General was so fair and wise now, it was hard to imagine him being so reckless. 

“My General had to be called back to fix the whole mess. The galaxy who I had attacked was enraged--and rightfully so. Neither of us wanted a war, but they called for a resignation.” 

Spot took a deep breath. “Not my resignation. My boss’s. I was still technically under his command, and so the attack had legally been under his orders. He was dishonorably discharged from his position, and I was--ridiculously--promoted.” He took another sip. “Well, that’s the military for you.” 

Race hesitated, not knowing what to say. How should he respond to a story to like that? 

He didn’t have to. Spot leaned close, over his desk and studied Race and--God, those intense  _ eyes.  _

“The first time I let you lead a mission, you didn't fire. You went straight for the diplomatic option. That’s when I knew you were good.  _ Better  _ than good. I knew you wouldn’t make the same mistake I did.” 

Race looked away. “But soldiers still got killed,” he said, frowning. 

“That happens,” Spot told him. “We’re a _ military ship _ . The soldiers on it knew what they signed up for. There are going to be some losses, but that doesn’t it make it your fault.” 

Race shrugged. “I guess.” 

“Hey,” Spot said, his voice uncharacteristically compassionate. “Look at me.” 

The Lieutenant slowly lifted his head to meet the General’s eyes. Something deep in his gut churned, like molten lava as he did. Maybe it was the whiskey, but Race had never gotten drunk over a single glass of it. 

It was definitely the whiskey, he told himself, as his body moved of its own accord. He set the glass on the table, drawn toward Spot’s deep brown eyes, leaned in, and--before he could stop himself--pressed his lips to the General’s. 

Spot didn’t pull back. Instead, he reached a hand up to Race’s face and placed a palm on his cheek. The places he touched burned like fire and sent shivers down his spine. 

_The whiskey…_ he thought rather incoherently, and the rest of his comprehensible thoughts sailed from his mind as Spot pulled him closer, and slid a hand around behind his neck.   _It was the whiskey talking…_

 

...Except it wasn’t. The two of them were drawn to each other more and more as time went on, and soon they were like teenagers again, pulling the other into the nearest closet whenever they could get some free time. They could barely keep their hands off each other--every minute in the Control room was electrically charged, every brief brush against each other a burning spark, and Race found himself spending more and more time in the General’s office during the nights. 

He wasn’t exactly sure what they were. They weren’t exactly  _ lovers,  _ they couldn’t be because it was forbidden for a superior officer to be with a younger one, but it wasn’t like a one-night stand either. 

They were undefinable. They were in love _ ,  _ two planets in the sky, orbiting each other but never truly touching. It was beautiful, it was tragic, it was  _ romance.  _

It wouldn’t last… 

“He broke it off,” Race told Jack bitterly, back in the hospital bed. “One night, out of the blue. We were so close to each other, and the next thing I knew, he was handing me a resignation form. He said we couldn’t be together anymore, that he couldn’t be with me and focus on commanding his ship at the same time. We just couldn’t work together anymore. And just like that--” he snapped his fingers, “I was discharged. They dumped me off on a small planet with a few credits and left. That’s where you found me, Jack.” 

The Captain was silent, processing the whole story. “I’m sorry, Race.” 

“I never wanted to see him again,” he continued, shaking his head. “I never wanted to  _ hear  _ his name ever again. But, it was just my luck…” He dropped his head into his hands and groaned. “Why does it have to be so fucking  _ complicated?”  _

Jack patted his shoulder. “I hear you,” he said. “I get it. But you’ve got a family here, Race, and you know what? We’ll support you, no matter what.” 

Race peeked up at him, and suddenly, he was so young again. 

“We won’t leave you,” Jack said. 

“Promise?” Race asked in a very small voice. 

“I promise.” 

A comfortable silence settled in between them, one that fell naturally after years of friendship and trust. Jack could remember when he first found Race, alone and hungry, with almost nothing to his name but a ship he had managed to put together out of junk. But there was still a spark of defiance in his eyes, and he had known immediately: this boy would fit right in on his ship. 

“Jack…” Race said slowly, as if something had just come to him. “There was one more thing. Before we left... Spot told me I needed to find someone, a person named Katherine. Said I would know her when I see her. You ever met anybody with that name?” 

Jack shook his head. “No,” he responded, following Race’s gaze out to the depths of the stars, where the shadow of the  _ Brooklyn  _ had lurked. 

“Katherine…” he muttered. 

 

* * *

 

The ship was silent save for the soft snores of the crew and the occasional rattling of loose parts as they knocked into the wall. 

Jack carefully pushed his way through, gently stilling Junkies as he passed so they wouldn’t go flying in random directions as they slept. He had just caught Finch as he tumbled into by when a low voice sounded behind him. 

“Do they always party this hard?” 

Jack turned to see Davey bracing himself on the ceiling behind him. “Shouldn’t you still be in the sick bay?” 

Davey waved him off. “Shouldn’t you be getting tired of asking me that question? I’m fine.” 

“Right,” Jack whispered. “Then how come Jojo hasn’t taken off your wristband yet?” He pointed to Davey’s wrist where a small yellow tag was tied to him. Jojo had invented it when Junkies tried to sneak out of the sick bay, to tip off the others that they should be resting. Most of the crew had figured out they could just take the tag off, but Davey clearly hadn’t even noticed it. He yanked it off now. 

“Really,” he muttered. “I’m okay. I took those calcium pills or whatever. And besides, we’re in zero-gravity. That’s not supposed to affect me.” 

Jack shook his head and exhaled heavily. The new guy was stubborn. “I’m only trying to make sure you stay safe.” 

“I don’t need you to protect me,” Davey shot back, but immediately winced as if he regretted the words. “Sorry,” he corrected. “I know you’re trying. I just… It’s been so long since there’s been anybody but me and Les. I’m so used to having to watch out for him…” 

“It’s alright,” Jack said, surprised at the sudden admission. “No, I understand. Most of these guys,” he gestured to the sleeping Junkies, “They were like that too. Took a while to get them trusting folks again.” 

Davey nodded, his lips tight. 

Jack folded his arms, adopting a more serious tone. “I do think you owe me an explanation though,” he chastised. “We heard on the  _ Brooklyn’s _ sick bay that you and your brother worked in the mines.” 

Davey looked at him quizzically. “The mines?” 

“Well, either that, or you practically took a dive into nuclear radiation. That’s why you got that bone thing.” 

The stowaway pondered that. “We didn’t work in the mines,” he said slowly. “But I think I do know where it could have come from.” 

Jack spread his hands. “Do tell.” 

“It’s a long story.” 

“That would be the second one today.” 

Davey considered him, really searched Jack up and down. Jack wondered what he was thinking. Maybe he was questioning is he could trust him? If he wanted to stay on their ship? If Jack was gonna turn him in for… whatever he had done? 

“Okay,” Davey finally said. “I’ll tell you. How much do you know about neon?” 

Before he could finish however, the radio suddenly crackled to life. 

_ “-- to the Manhattan. Come in, Manhattan. Are you all awake over there?”  _ Jack and Davey exchanged a look, then pushed their way over to the com system. 

“This is Captain Jack Kelly of the  _ Manhattan,”  _ Jack said into the radio. “Who are we hailing?” 

_ “Jack! So good to hear your voice again!”  _

Jack grinned at the response and met Davey’s questioning eyes. 

“Is that you, Ms. Medda?” he replied fondly. “What are you doing all the way out here?” 

_ “Well I could ask the same of you! I see the state of your ship. What in the galaxy have you gotten yourselves into this time?”  _

“It’s a long story, Medda,” he answered sheepishly as he winked at Davey. “Want to talk about it over a nice cup of your famous tea?” 

_ “Of course! I’ve missed your stories. We’ll pick you right up, just you hang tight.”  _

The radio fell to static, and Jack hung it back up. 

“Who was that?” Davey asked. 

“That,” Jack said with a large smile. “Was the Medda with the  _ Bowery,  _ most famous entertainment ship in this whole side of the Universe. She’s amazing. You’re gonna love her.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So um... yeah. Sprace.


	7. Bright Lights, Blinded Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack introduces Davey to Medda's entertainment ship, and in return Davey finally reveals his past. Also, Race makes an important bargain.

_ “You see I usually find myself among strangers  _

_ because I drift here and there _

_ trying to forget the sad things that happened to me.” _

_    
―F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby _

 

* * *

 

 

"Take my hand,” Jack said dramatically, and with a grand flourish he extended his hand out to Davey. He was wearing his nicest Junker uniform and cap, both which he had pulled from the depths of his closet and dusted off. He made sure to tilt his head just right to the side so that the fluorescent light would make his hazel eyes twinkle, and god _ damn  _ if he didn’t say he knew he looked incredibly attractive at that moment.

But Davey only gave him a look and climbed out of the space elevator next to him. “I can walk down stairs by myself, Jack.” 

The Captain pouted teasingly, his arm dropping limply to his side. “What, haven’t you heard of romance?” 

“Oh, is that what that was? I couldn’t tell.” Davey said nonchalantly with his hands stuck in his pockets and Jack honestly couldn’t tell decide he was playing or being serious. “This is the  _ Bowery?”  _

In all fairness, Davey wasn’t wrong to be unimpressed. The little anteroom they had stepped into was small and cold, with hard cement walls and stony floor-tiling. He had expected something… grander. Something more worthy of being called the most famous entertainment ship in the Universe. 

“Oh, just you wait,” Jack laughed, leaping in front of Davey towards a door he hadn’t noticed before. “Medda ain’t big on first impressions. She doesn’t  _ have _ to be.”  

He grabbed the handle and mockingly bowed as he slowly opened the door for Davey. 

Davey was just about shoot Jack a glare, but he stopped as he saw the sight that lay on the other side of the door. 

It was… spectacular. An explosion of color and light and movement and noise: showers of confetti rained from the ceiling as scantily-clad dancers covered the stage in bright pink feathers. The sound of champagne bottles was almost continuous, a definite  _ pop pop pop  _ that was just barely drowned out by the music. And, by god, the  _ music.  _

It was surreal, unlike anything Davey had ever heard of before. The high-pitched wailing of sopranos combined with jazzy trumpets and banging drums was somehow upbeat and light and giddy, and he couldn’t help but let a slow smile spread across his face. It was the wildest party scene he had ever seen, and it definitely diffused the looming darkness of space he was used to. 

“Crazy, right?” Jack shouted over the din. Davey nodded slightly. 

“She’s got quite the twenty’s feel going on, hasn’t she?” he responded, distracted by a passing dancer. 

“Twenty’s?” Jack laughed. “Is that what you see?” 

Davey tore his eyes away. “What do you mean?” 

Jack leaned in. “Well,” he explained. “The ship’s got a neural holographic projector. It reads your thoughts as you walk in, and projects an entertainment scene based on what it finds. So, basically, I’m seeing a party from my teenage years, off the back deck of my house.” 

Davey covered his head with his hands reflexively. “It’s reading my mind?!” he shouted. Jack just laughed harder and slapped him on the back. 

“Relax, it’s not  _ actually  _ seeing your thoughts. Just your projections.” Davey didn’t exactly understand what he meant, but he slowly lowered his hands all the same. Up on stage, a male singer slowly descended a large flight of stairs, trilling a screaming note. 

“Based off what it finds in my mind, huh?” Davey muttered, his eyes glued to the singer as he danced down the steps. 

Jack elbowed him. “I can’t believe you’re seeing a twenties party! I can’t even picture what that looks like. Where the hell did you ever see one? You got some secret life I don’t know about?” 

Davey shook his head. “You ever read Great Gatsby?” 

Jack made a face. “Read? Who reads anymore?” Davey rolled his eyes, unsurprised by the response. A passing waiter, dressed in a sharp butler’s outfit passed by, carrying two glasses of champagne. Jack snagged two, and handed one to Davey. 

“Here!” he said, and as Jack held it, it transformed into a aluminum beer can. Davey stared at it in wonder for a second. “You have champagne? Hah! Man that must be one fancy party.” 

Davey glanced down at his glass, then caught himself. “I don’t drink,” he said, shaking his head and reached out to give it back to a passing waiter. Jack grabbed his hand. 

“Aw, come on,” he implored. “One glass couldn’t hurt.” 

Davey frowned and leveled his eyes at Jack. “I don’t drink,” he repeated, and set the glass down at a nearby table. He turned his back to the Junkie, and began pushing through the crowd. 

“Oh, Davey! Wait--Davey! Wait up!” Jack called after him, pushing his half-finished beer can at a random person and running after him. 

Davey found himself drawn to the stage. It was magnificent, and decked out in glitter and feathers and bright fabrics of all kinds. The singer had moved onto the chorus and was now belting it out with all his heart as a line of girls high-kicked behind him. The energy of it all was hypnotizing, and Davey couldn’t tear his eyes away. 

A hand clapped on his shoulder, and Davey turned, expecting to meet the eyes of Jack. Instead, he came face to face with a sharply dressed man, who wore a knowing smile on his face. “Hey there, old sport,” he said, as if he had Davey had been long-time friends, and the sound of the party dimmed. “I didn’t think I’d see you back again so soon.” 

Davey relaxed. He knew who this person was; he’d read about him many times during his childhood. “It’s good to finally meet you, Gatsby.” he replied. 

The man’s eyes were sharp and twinkling, and Davey got the sudden impression that the man knew everything he was thinking. “You know you need to go back there,” he said, and Davey’s blood ran cold. “You know what you have to do.” 

Davey shook his head. “I can’t. Pulitzer--” 

“I think this is more than about stopping Pulitzer, don’t you?” the man said, and for a brief moment his smile was lost, replaced with a darker look. But within a second, it was gone and he was waving his hand. “I’d love to stay and chat with you, old sport, but I’ve got other guests to attend to. I’ll see you around.” And just like that, the man disappeared into the crowd. 

Davey stared in shock at the spot where he just was, unable to comprehend what had just happened. 

Jack appeared next to him, panting and bracing himself on Davey’s shoulder. “A man…” Davey started to say, but couldn’t finish his sentence.   
Jack seemed to understand though. “Came up to talk to you? Yeah, that was the neural interface. Medda’s parties can be too enticing sometimes, so she installed it to talk some sense into people who’ve overstayed.” He regarded Da. “Weird it came to you so soon, though.” 

Davey shook his head. “It’s right. I shouldn’t be here. We need to go.” 

“Woah, woah, woah,” Jack stopped him. “We’ve only just arrived. And I haven’t even introduced you to Ms. Medda!” He started to say more, trying to convince him that they should stay longer, that after everything they just went through they  _ deserve  _ a break, but Davey turned to him just then with a look of dismay and Jack’s words died in his mouth. 

“Alright,” he said softly. “Okay, why don’t we go find a quieter place, and you can tell me what this is all about.” Davey nodded slowly. “I know this ship pretty well, I’m sure we can find somewhere to go. Come on.”

 

* * *

 

“Hey, guys, it’s Race!” a Junkie shouted, and the Deck erupted into shouts and applause. 

Race grinned and pushed his way through the door, his arms spread wide as he graciously accepted his cheers. He bowed dramatically, but he moved too quickly and ended rolling all the way over. 

“I’m back!” he called, laughing. “You fellas miss me?” 

“Now don’t go getting such a big head,” Albert jeered. “You wasn’t gone that long!” 

Race casually flipped him off and pushed his way toward the Captain’s chair. “Ah, but see,”  he said, running his hand over the smooth plastic. “Without Jack here, I should at least be able to sit--” 

“Careful, Race!” Crutchie said behind him and Race jumped, whipping around. “I think that chair belongs to me right now.” Amidst whoops and hollers, he pushed Race out of the way and swung himself in the chair, although the closest he could get to sitting in it was slightly hovering over the seat. 

“Aw, Crutch,” Race complained. “Can’t I sit in it just once?” 

Crutchie pretended to think it over. “What would I get in return?” 

“How about a go at the  _ Corona _ ?” Race suggested, and a low ‘oooh’ spread throughout the room. It wasn’t often that Race let the other Junkies pilot his small ship, but it was famous for being fast and strong. A high-tech ship straight from the  _ Brooklyn  _ itself, he used it primarily for catching junk, but it could go up to speeds as fast as the winds in the Harlem Belt. The last time someone had piloted it, Buttons, it had crashed into a large asteroid and since then, Race had been super protective of it. The fact that he was offering a go at it to Crutchie was no small deal. 

Crutchie raised an eyebrow and a barely concealed grin stretched across his face. “Really?” he asked. 

Race sighed dramatically and nodded. “Just once. And only for a couple of minutes.” 

Crutchie rubbed his hands together in excitement. “And in return you get to sit in the Captain’s chair… what? Until Jack gets back from the  _ Bowery _ ?” 

“Really, Race?” Finch asked. “Sitting in the chair is that important to you?” The other boys nodded in agreement. 

Race shot him a look, then turned back to Crutchie. “So do we have a deal, or what?” 

Crutchie beamed and spat into his hand. “Deal.” They shook. 

“Alright, now get out of my seat,” Race commanded, waving with his hand and Crutchie eagerly bounded out. Race pulled himself in, using the undersides of the armrest to keep him in place. The boys watched him as he made a show of it. 

“So when can I drive it?” Crutchie asked in anticipation, but Race simply held up a finger. 

“Hold on,” he said, and reached a hand slowly down the inside of the chair. He ran his palm all the way to the corner, where he found a latch, and pulled. 

As they watched, a try unfolded from within the chair, unraveling with packets of alcohol of all kinds: rum, whiskey, bourbon, wine and more. The Deck was instantly overcome with mutters and shouts of indignation as Race grinned widely and pulled out a small packet. 

“I’m only catching up on last night,” he said flippantly, and knocked it back. “Plus I’ll need this if you really are going to pilot the  _ Corona,  _ Crutchie. We all knows you ain’t the best pilot.” 

The insult didn’t faze him, but the Junkie slowly shook his head and smiled. “You sure are clever, Race.” 

Race laughed and held up his packet. “Cheers to that,” he said, and drank it too. 

There, on the chair, with a packet of beer in each hand and a sure sight of space from the window, amidst the cries of his inferiors, he felt like the king of the universe. 

 

* * *

 

Jack and Davey had found a small room empty of any people, and were now sitting on the ground, their backs leaning against opposite sides. 

(It wasn’t the first room they tried, of course, but it was the first room clear of any people doing... activities.)

“Okay,” Jack said after they had been sitting for awhile, and it became clear Davey wasn’t gonna start the conversation. He gestured to him. “So tell me about yourself.” 

“What do you want to know?” Davey asked in a low tone. 

“Anything you want to tell me.” 

“I don’t even know where to begin.” Jack thought for a minute. 

“Tell me about your childhood. Where did you grow up?” 

Davey glanced up at him then, with wide vulnerable eyes and Jack swallowed a lump in his throat. He nodded encouragingly, and Davey took a deep breath. 

“Me and Les grew up on a satellite,” he began, and Jack found himself hanging on to every word. “Our father was a researcher. He studied Neon.” 

“Neon?” Jack asked, surprised. “Why?” 

“Before humanity expanded into the stars, Neon wasn’t used for much. It was used a  _ lot,  _ sure, in electronic billboards and lights, but that was about the extent of its purpose. But my dad… he thought we weren’t using it to the fullest extent. After years of research, he concluded that the effects of neon were dulled by the oxygen in our atmosphere. He petitioned the government, asking for a grant that would let him study it in the surroundings of space. They gave it to him, and with the money he bought a satellite which he named the  _ Singer. _ ” 

“The Singer?” Davey nodded, waiting as realization dawned on Jack. “But wasn’t that one of the first full-time satellites in Space?” 

“Yeah.” 

“But that was nearly a hundred years ago,” Jack said, his eyes narrowed. “So how--?” 

“I’m getting there,” Davey said with a wave of his hand. “My dad and my mom lived together, working on their project for many years. Eventually, they had a child: me. 

“They raised me on the  _ Singer  _ with them, and ten years later they had my brother Les. For a long time, we were a happy family. My father researched while my mother worked on her autobiography and took care of maintenance and such. We weren’t high-tech, but we were functioning. Until one day, when one of my father’s experiments went wrong.” 

Jack didn’t move, so enthralled by the story that he was frozen in place. 

“One of the tanks carrying his neon developed a leak, causing the gas to release throughout the whole ship. Neon is colorless and odorless, and we didn’t even know we were exposed to it until Dad found the leak when he was inspecting it one day. Two days later, my mom fell into a deep sleep. We couldn’t wake her up, and we feared the worst, but when we took scans of her body, they showed her mind was still very much alive. My dad had researched neon’s effects on plants and small bacteria, but never on humans. We didn’t know exactly what was happening to her--or what would happen to us. 

“One day, I went to go wake my dad up in the morning, but I couldn’t. He wouldn’t move, no matter how hard I shook. We knew he had what our om had, and Les and I were left alone. 

“And then it happened to me too. I went to bed, and all I remember is darkness. When I woke up the satellite was old and rusting. The food had long since rotted away, and nearly all the oxygen had been lost, eaten by the plants. Les was by my bedside, still asleep. He woke up a few days later, but my parents…” 

Jack reached a hand out as Davey trailed off. “I’m…” He was at a loss for words. “I’m so sorry.” 

The boy waved him off. “Me and Les have been by ourselves ever since. We sent out a distress signal and were picked up by nearby ships. Guess who owned them?” 

“Pulitzer,” Jack said darkly, and Davey nodded. 

“He’s the head of the largest multi-trillion dollar industry in the whole galaxy: exploration. He was the one who granted my Father the loan. His company, The World, owns half of all the spaceships in the Universe. At the snap of his fingers, he could make space travel that much more expensive. And he plans to.” 

Jack connected the pieces together. “With neon.” 

“Yeah. Me and Les are perfect examples of how neon can be used in cryogenics. If Pulitzer could develop a safe and efficient way to make cryogenics chambers, he wouldn’t have to worry about making the fastest and best engines anymore to remain on top. And he’d be able to charge a fortune for the chambers too.” 

Jack furrowed his eyebrows, processing everything Davey had told him. “Space travel’d be a rich guy’s deal. No more junking.” 

“No more popping around from planet to planet. Jack, think about it. Millions of people’s jobs would be at stake. More than that, their whole  _ lives  _ are at stake. Some planets are completely dependant on trade to survive.” 

“That ain’t right,” Jack agreed. “But... wouldn’t other companies just come up with better engines?” 

Davey shook his head. “Not when Pulitzer’s already bought out half of the Solar Senate. They wouldn’t even stop him if he tried to place trade restrictions. Jack…” He stopped, as if a thought had just occurred to him. When he spoke again, his voice was hushed. “He could monopolize the whole  _ Universe. _ ”

 

* * *

 

The beat of loud electronic dance music pounded in his ears as Jack stood outside the door to the closet, rubbing his hands over his face and trying to comprehend what the hell he had just heard. Pulitzer… He had never liked the guy, but it wasn’t like they interacted on a day to day basis. Mostly, Jack would just have to dodge his patrol ships whenever he tried to sneak into a space junkyard. 

He’d heard of bad guys. Met some, even. But this? This was some next level shit. This was plain  _ evil.  _

The very thought of what he was trying to do made Jack grind his teeth. Replace the use of engines? He and his crew depended on those engines to  _ survive _ \--and it wasn’t like they were doing much wrong! There’s no crime to taking things someone else had thrown away. They were barely able to afford enough food, oxygen and water as it was to stay alive. If they had to wait every time they wanted to get to a selling port, well, they wouldn’t last a year--let alone the rest of their lives. 

They weren’t doing anything wrong. 

But what could he do? The only ship that maybe  _ might  _ provide some kind of backup was the  _ Brooklyn,  _ and they had already very likely fallen into the hands of Pulitzer. He commanded one Junker ship, with a crew of twenty or thirty boys. They could get out of small skirmishes but taking on Pulitzer meant war. They wouldn’t make it out of a war. 

Davey slowly stepped out of the closet, silent and waiting as Jack pondered. 

Suddenly, the Captain turned and kicked the wall next to him. “ _ Damn  _ it!” he shouted in frustration. “Why the hell do old white men always have to be so  _ greedy?  _ Why can’t they just be happy with what they’ve got? Why do they just have to keep  _ taking _ from us? Why can’t they just let us live our lives?” Davey stood next to him somberly, his hands in his pockets as he waited out Jack’s temper tantrum. 

“There’s no crime to being poor,” Jack panted as he withdrew from the wall, defeat in his voice. “That ain’t no crime…” 

“I know,” Davey whispered, and with his words, Jack felt himself start to calm down. He glanced at the guy out of the corner of his eye, taking in the way his eyes were lowered to the ground, the way he stood slightly in front of Jack as if he were shielding him from the view of the rowdy teenagers, or the weight of the burden that had just been placed on his shoulders. The way he held himself made him look almost casual at first glance, but as Jack studied him-- _ really  _ studied him--there was a layer of concealed grim determination that churned like a raging ocean within. 

The very sight sobered Jack and he pulled away from the wall. 

“Davey--” he began to say, but he was interrupted as a stranger placed his hand on his shoulder. Jack turned and met a random teenager face to face. 

“Jack Kelly,” he said in an eerily robotic voice. “Ms. Medda Larkin wishes to see you. She requests you stop kicking the walls of her ship.” 

Jack rubbed the back of his neck abashedly. “Tell her I’ll be right there,” he told the teenager, and glanced at Davey. “I guess we’ve been summoned.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has been leaving comments that put a smile on my face everyday! I appreciate all of them, even if I haven't had the chance to respond to all of them yet. You know who you are :) 
> 
> Also, sorry to everyone who hasn't read the Great Gatsby, and didn't fully catch all the references. All you need to know is Davey was a giant book nerd in his childhood, and Gatsby may have felt more of a father figure than his own dad... 
> 
> In addition, a disclaimer. I'm going to be taking some more liberties with the Jacobs' backstory, and that might not always line up with what is canon in the movie (tbh I haven't actually seen the full 1992 movie, just bits and pieces)! Along those lines, unfortunately Sarah Jacobs won't be making a big appearance in this story... but you might keep your eyes open for a cameo ;) 
> 
> That was quite a long footnote, heh heh.


	8. Watch What Happens

_ Just look around at the world we're inheriting _

_ and think of the one we'll create _

_ Their mistake is they got old, that is not a mistake we'll be making _

_ No sir, we'll stay young forever _

 

* * *

 

 

Medda’s office was, to say the least, glorious. Satin silks of bright pinks and yellows and purples draped the walls of the office. Grandiose chairs and couches were displayed perfectly on top of luxurious throw rugs, and diamonds sparkled like snowflakes as they were suspended from the ceiling in lines and swung in hypnotizing patterns. A window that wasn’t exactly a window framed the whole back half of her office, a picture of space that swirled and spun in quite literal rainbows. In front of it lay a marvelous oak desk with intricate spiraling patterns carved into the sides. 

It was exactly befitting of the one who must be in command of this grandiose ship. 

“Jack! Welcome!” A large, boisterous woman turned from where she posed in the corner, laying down a small picture frame and throwing her arms open wide. 

“Ms. Medda!” Jack exclaimed happily, running right into her arms and holding her tight. Davey hung back awkwardly. 

“Where have you been Jack?” she asked fondly as she pulled away and sized him up. “I heard you’re a  _ fine _ Captain now.” 

“Unofficially,” he laughed, and turned to gesture toward Davey. “Actually, he’s one of my crew. Here, Davey, come here and meet the great Ms. Medda Larkin.” 

“A pleasure,” she said, extending one hand decked in pearls. Davey took it and brought her fingers to his lips as he bowed slightly. 

“The pleasure is all mine, ma’am.” 

“Ooh, he’s such a gentleman!” she said to Jack, beaming down at the boy. “I  _ like _ him.” 

Jack was looking at him odd, and he nodded absently. “Yeah…” Davey’s face turned a slight shade of pink. 

“Anyways, you two,” Medda said, offering them a seat by her desk. “Tell me what you’ve been up to.” 

Jack and Davey slowly took their seats and exchanged glances. “Quite a lot, actually,” Davey said. 

“We… picked up stowaways, broke down in the middle of the Harlem belt, I got arrested, uncovered a conspiracy in the government, got attacked by goons of the person who is leading said conspiracy, managed to escape, got attacked  _ again  _ and then got stranded again,” Jack added, counting it out on his fingers. “I think that’s it, am I missing anything?” Davey shook his head as Jack looked over at him to check. 

“Goodness,” Ms. Medda gasped, clasping her hands together. “Jack, how do you even manage to get yourself into such fixes?” 

“It’s a talent.” 

“And do tell, what is this conspiracy you mentioned?” 

“Well… um. Davey, do you want to explain it all?” Jack offered, gestured to his companion. With a roll of his eyes, Davey nodded and leaned forward to fill in Medda. 

It was a long story, even longer as he spoke of Pulitzer’s warrant for Jack’s arrest and how it was the  _ Brooklyn _ that surprised everyone by saving them and eventually sacrificing itself-- 

“The  _ Brooklyn?”  _ Medda cut in. “Is that what happened to the General?” 

“You know Spot?” Jack asked, surprised. “How?” 

She waved him off. “That’s my own story. Go ahead and continue.” 

There wasn’t much left after that, but Medda was a surprisingly good listener. Her large eyes revealed the intelligence behind them as she nodded at exactly the right spots and managed to ask questions Davey hadn’t even thought to answer. When he finally finished, she thought for a moment, pondering his story. 

“I understand,” she said. “Well, I suppose that means you’re ready to meet Katherine.” 

Davey and Jack exchanged another glance. “Katherine--?” 

“Oh, shit!” Jack exclaimed suddenly. “Race mentioned her! Said Spot told him to find her. Ms. Medda, you know…?” 

She beamed at him. “Why, yes I do. In fact, she’s actually on this very ship.” 

Medda dramatically reached below her desk and started feeling around the underside. “Just a moment,” she said. “It always takes me a second to find the dang thing… here we go!” With a twist her hand, she released a hidden lever, and a panel of her wall began to rattle and slowly slide open. 

Jack and Davey jumped up from their seats and stared at the wall in shock. An entire portion of fabrics and satin pulled away to reveal a bright, fluorescently lit room that much resembled the  _ Brooklyn’s  _ Control room. 

Inside, people bustled about carrying tablets and stacks of paper that they flipped through. The sides were layered in screens that displayed various dots and calculations, far beyond Jack’s knowledge. 

At the center of the room was a large conference table, lit up with screens, and a young woman with a tight ponytail sat at the far end, scrolling through and discussing what seemed to be something important with a few agents over her shoulder. 

“Ahem.” Medda cleared her throat, and the chatter died down. The woman looked up, her red bangs lifting slightly as she did. 

“Ms. Medda,” she said kindly, and her skeptical eyes skimmed them up and down. “This them?” 

“They sure are,” Medda replied and turned to the pair. “Boys, this is Ms. Katherine Pulitzer: leader of the resistance.” 

“Resistance?” Jack said at the same time as Davey said, “Pulitzer?” 

Katherine came over and stuck her hand out. “The one and only. It’s very nice to meet you--” Jack reached for her hand, but before he could take it, she turned, “--Mr. Jacobs.” 

“Me?” Davey asked in disbelief, and hesitantly took her hand as Jack abashedly withdrew his. 

“Yes, you,” Katherine replied with an easy smile. “We’ve heard a lot about Hearst station. I have to say, I’m glad you’re on our side.” 

“Wh--Davey, you didn’t tell me about that!” Jack cut in, hitting Davey on the arm, and Katherine switched her gaze to him. 

“And you are…?” 

Jack quickly stuck his hand out again. “Captain Jack Kelly.” She regarded it with a raised eyebrow for a brief moment before finally taking it. 

“Pleasure.” She turned back towards the table where she had been working and began to talk. “We had picked up Davey and his brother after he managed to escape from Pulitzer--” She faced them suddenly, her mouth in a straight line. “And before you ask, yes Joseph Pulitzer was my dad. I trust that won’t be a problem?” 

Jack and Davey quickly replied with a “no ma’am,” and she continued. 

“We gave him a place to stay for a while in exchange for information about his father’s research. When we were done, we gave him a ship and some credits, and dropped him and his brother off at one of our safe houses on a nearby planet. I take it that wasn’t quite enough for you, was it, Mr. Jacobs?” 

“Just Davey is fine…” he muttered, scratching the back of his neck and giving a meek shrug when Jack turned to him with a look of confusion.

“I assume you and your brother continued to chase after Pulitzer. Well, I’m glad you did. Hearst station got very close to finding the perfect formula for neon.” 

“Thanks,” Davey said with a small smile. “It really wasn’t that big of a deal…” 

“It was for our cause. You managed to by us some much needed time. Speaking of, by the way, how is Les? I liked him!” 

“He’s back on the ship,” Davey said casually. “He’d probably like to say hi too. You two really hit it off--” 

“Wait, wait, wait.” Jack stopped them both as he shook his head and raised his arms in the air in frustration. “You mean… Davey. You knew about this?” He gestured to all around them “This--this  _ resistance?  _ And you just never bothered to tell me?” 

The boy gave him an apologetic look. “It really didn’t come up.” 

_ “Didn’t come up? _ How’s about ten minutes ago in the closet, when you were telling me your whole life’s story? That would have been a  _ perfect  _ time!” 

“I’m sorry Jack,” Davey shot back. “I didn’t realize I was obligated to tell you every detail about me.” 

“ _ This isn’t a detail! It’s a pretty damn big deal!”  _

“Boys--” Katherine interrupted, glancing between them. “Can this wait? Or do you two need to take it back to the… closet?” Jack and Davey drew back from each other, embarrassed at their outburst. 

“Sorry,” Jack muttered, and Davey nodded in agreement. 

“Thank you.” Katherine bent down over the table and began typing something in to the screen. “Now, I’ve heard you two were the last to see the  _ Brooklyn.  _ Do you know what happened to it?” 

Jack and Davey exchanged glances, and the Captain exhaled heavily. “They’re gone.” 

Katherine jerked her head up. “Gone?” 

Davey nodded. “They stranded themselves to get us away from Snyder and the  _ Refuge.  _ We think Pulitzer’s brought them back in.” 

“Damn it,” she cursed. “Spot was our strongest military ally. We’re definitely going to need to replan some of our attacks.” 

“Attacks?” Jack asked in alarm. “Like… war?” 

Katherine bit her lip as she nodded, distracted. “Mostly on my father’s research stations. Although we have quite a few agents undercover in the Senate to flush out those people he’s paid off. Which, actually,” She looked up at him, “brings me to my point--why Medda found you. We have a favor to ask of you and your crew.” 

Davey and Jack exchanged a wary glance. “...What is it?” 

“Originally you were supposed to play a smaller role, but with the  _ Brooklyn  _ gone we need someone to fill their place in our upcoming mission. We’ve been strategizing this for quite a while, and this is a hit we can’t afford to not take. Pulitzer is getting too close to the formula. Now you and your crew has gained quite a reputation for yourselves, and from what we’ve heard, you might be a very strong ally.” 

Jack was speechless. 

“What do you say, Captain? Will you join our movement?” 

A silence descended on them as Jack tried to comprehend exactly what she was saying.  

“Wait a second,” he said slowly, raising his arms. “Now, just wait. Hold on. You’re asking me to put my ship and my crew at risk to fight...this--this isn’t even my war! I don’t even  _ know  _ the guy. The Junkies… they’s just kids! I’m not about to--to send them into  _ battle!  _ Especially not against someone who  _ owns  _ the government! Davey, back me up here.” 

The Junkie jumped at suddenly being put under the spotlight. “This isn’t my decision,” he deflected quickly, and Jack frowned. 

“Davey…” he pleaded. “Come on. You know these kids, they--they  _ rescued  _ you! And now you’re willing to just… throw them headfirst into danger?” 

“This is a war,” Davey shot back. “It’s going to be dangerous, whether you like it or not.” 

_ “It’s not my war!”  _

“It’s  _ everyone’s  _ war,” Katherine cut in. “This isn’t some… fantasy, Jack. This isn’t an idealized universe, where the bad guy gets defeated, and everyone goes home happy. This isn’t just about a few people not wanting to pay extra for transportation. There’s more to it than that--there’s a story  _ behind  _ the story. This is about basic human rights, the right’s we’re owed just by existing! This about tyranny in the government, this is about greed and corruption and fixing a system that’s been broken for far too long.  _ That’s  _ what this is all about. And it won’t be solved by running away. It’ll be solved by standing up for what we believe in.” 

“We need to show Pulitzer we mean business,” Davey added. “We’re not gonna back down! He has to be the one to surrender, or he’ll just keep getting pounded--” 

“No, Davey!” Jack shot back angrily. “What happens if my crew gets hurt? What happens if someone--someone  _ dies,  _ huh? Are you willing to shoulder that burden? Are you willing to put them in the middle of a firefight, because Davey, if they--if  _ anyone-- _ gets hurt, then that’s on  _ you _ .” 

“Why don’t you let them make that decision on their own?” Davey quietly responded. 

A beat. 

“Maybe… maybe there’s another way,” Jack bargained. “Maybe there’s something that Pulitzer wants that we can negotiate with, or--” 

“Yeah,” Davey cut in. “There is. Power. And money. Pulitzer is a greedy old man, and he needs to be stopped!” 

“Or do you have a problem with that, Jack?” Katherine added. 

“I’m not saying I don’t want to take him down. But… I’m just--there’s gotta be another way. I’ve seen a battle, I just  _ fought  _ in one and I saw it--we got our asses kicked! There’s no way we can fight him head on and win.”

“Jack,” Davey said gently, and the tone of his voice made Jack reluctantly glance at him. “We’re  _ resisting.  _ It’s going to be dangerous, and yeah maybe some guys will get hurt. But… we’re fighting for  _ freedom.  _ Is that not worth it?” Jack shook his head, but Davey pressed on. “Think about the Junkies. Your ship. If Pulitzer gets his way… they won’t exist anymore. There wouldn’t be anymore space travel and, Jack--” he broke off, and pushed Jack’s shoulder so he was looking him right in the eyes. “You wouldn’t be able to go see Earth anymore.” 

“How’d you know about that?” Jack muttered, unable to keep meeting Davey’s intense gaze. 

“I put two and two together,” he said lightly, and Jack could practically  _ hear  _ the smile in his words. “Also, Crutchie may have mentioned it while I was in the sick bay.” 

Jack hesitated, the fight in him drained. “You really think we’re gonna win? You really think it will all be worth it?” he asked him softly.

Davey and Katherine exchanged glances, and she nodded. “I do,” Davey said firmly. “I really do.” 

“So? Jack? You in?” Katherine asked, twisting her fingers.

There was a moment of indecision, and Jack glanced at Davey. Davey, with his eyes of steel and and brows set in hard determination. Davey who had been put through everything and still relied this much on faith. Davey, who, Jack realized with a surprise, he had come to trust even through their small amount of interactions. 

“You’re right,” he finally said, and nodded. “I’ll join your resistance--on one condition.” 

“What’s that?” Katherine asked. 

“I want my crew to be able to make their choice too. Anyone who doesn’t want to fight, they’re out. No buts.” 

She quickly nodded and smiled. “Deal.” 

Jack spit into his palm. “Shake, then.” Katherine, to her credit, didn’t even hesitate to spit and take his hand with a nice firm shake. He turned. “Davey, you too.” 

Davey, of course, made a face but he spat into his palm and took Jack’s hand. He smirked. 

“Just you wait, Jack. The poor guy’s head’ll be spinning.” 

 

* * *

 

Race quite enjoyed the jealous glances he was getting from the rest of the crew. He quite enjoyed smugly sipping packets of rum in the Captain’s chair as the others were forced to cling on to hand-holds just to remain upright. It was a little lonely, sure, but the alcohol was just starting to reach his head and frankly, at this point, he couldn’t give less of a shit about being lonely. 

“You sure is enjoying that, ain’t ya Race?” Albert called. 

“Sure am!” Race replied flippantly as he debated whether or not to steal anymore. 

“You gonna share any with us?” 

“Nope!”  _ Fuck it,  _ he thought as he fished out another packet.  _ Jack’s gonna kill me anyways.  _

As if summoned by thought, a sudden burst of static filled the Deck, and Race just about did a spit-take. He burst out of the chair and pushed himself far away from it. 

“I wasn’t doing nothing!” he shouted, slightly dizzy. He clutched his head and groaned, and in the background, could barely make out Mike and Ike laughing and high-fiving their wrenches. 

“The look on your face!” Albert managed as he doubled over in a fit of laughter. 

Race pulled himself together as he realized that Jack wasn’t, in fact, about to end his life right then and there. It was a prank. He made a fist at Albert. 

“You lookin for a fight?!” he threatened, as another wave of static overcame the room. “Alright! I get it! You can turn it off!” 

Mike and Ike shook their heads. “That ain’t us!” 

Albert’s laughter slowly died out as they both turned to look at them. “What do you mean that ain’t you?” 

“They mean,” cut it Specs from over near a monitor, “We’re getting a video call. From an unknown source.” 

“Is it the  _ Bowery?”  _ Finch asked. 

“Hey Finch, what part of ‘unknown source’ do you not understand?” Race jeered, as Crutchie finally spoke up. 

“Can you patch it through?” he asked Specs, and the Junkie shrugged. 

“It’s a high-frequency, short range transmission and our firewalls are nonexistent. It’ll come through whether we like it or not.” 

Race and Crutchie exchanged glances. “Well, put it up then.” 

Specs nodded, and typed a few commands into the keyboard. Within seconds, screens had descended from all around the room and a familiar face appeared on them. 

“Jack!” Crutchie called, a beaming smile breaking across his face. “How’s the  _ Bowery?  _ You missed a bunch, by the way. Race found your secret--” he was cut off as Race punched him in the shoulder. 

“Shut up,” he hissed, and shot a charming smile to the screen. “Lovely to see your beautiful face, Captain. What brings you to our humble dwellings?” 

_ “The Manhattan is MY ship, Race.”  _ Jack reminded him.  _ “You better not have touched any of my stuff.”  _

“Me? Never.” 

“Davey!” Les exclaimed suddenly, shooting towards one of the screens near him. “Where are you?” 

“I’m on the  _ Bowery.  _ You doing okay over there?” 

“Just fine! The boys taught me how to play the spoons, and Finch let me shoot his slingshot!” 

Davey laughed. “That sounds like fun, Les. Make sure you’re behaving yourself.” 

“I am!” 

“So Jack?” Crutchie asked once Les had turned happily away. “You got any good news for us?” 

The Captain very visibly took a deep breath. “Not quite good news, Crutch, but it’s news alright. Boys, Davey’s got a story to tell you…” 

In the end, the Junkies didn’t even hesitate to join the cause. 

“Sounds fun,” Race grinned with a crack of his knuckles. “I’d sure be happy to take on the Delancy’s myself!” 

“You’ll get your chance,” Jack promised. “So you’re all in?” 

“If it means taking a break from floating around and doing nothing?” Mike piped up. 

“If it means actually being able to shoot some big guns?” Ike added. 

“We’re in,” they said together, and the Junkies around them nodded in agreement. “When do we start?” 

“As soon as you’re ship is fixed and ready,” Katherine said suddenly, appearing on the screen for the first time amidst a wave of whoops and whistles. 

“Oh hey, hey, Jack!” Race shouted. “You didn’t tell us you got such a pretty lady with you!” 

“Don’t you have your own tragic love story to focus on?” Albert remarked snidely, and Race whacked him in the arm. 

Katherine grinned. “It’s not just my looks that got me this far, but thanks.” 

“And what might your name be, madam?” Romeo, ever the flirt, asked. She flashed him a tolerant smile. 

“My name is Katherine Pulitzer. Yes, my father is Joseph Pulitzer, and yes. I am the leader of this resistance.” 

Race stilled at her introduction, the name sending chills down his spine as a flash of Spot’s face intruded into his mind. 

_ ‘Find Katherine,’  _ he had said.  _ ‘You’ll know when you see her.’  _

Well, here she was. And Race couldn’t quite shake a sick churning in his gut, and a pang of longing hit his chest so hard he audibly gasped in. Albert looked to him with a worried expression, but Race waved him off and reluctantly he turned around. The Junkie still casually moved closer to him, though.

“Anyways, we’ll be sending Jack and Davey back to your ship with some spare parts, and you boys can get to work,” Katherine was saying. “In the meantime, we’ll brief you about the plan.”

“Do we get to blow things up?” Tommy Boy jumped in. 

“Ooh yeah,” she replied. “Lots of things.” He turned and high-fived Henry. “We’re going to sign off now, but we’ll stay in touch. Don’t go anywhere!” 

The screen turned to black. 

 

* * *

 

“Hey, Davey,” Jack called, running to catch up with the boy. Davey turned, his arms full of bags and spare parts. “Here, let me help.” 

“I’ve got it,” came the muffled reply, and Jack laughed. 

“Just let me take some,” he said, and reluctantly Davey gave him a few large poles of metal, which Jack hefted over his shoulder. They walked down the hall for a moment in silence. 

“You know,” Jack started after a bit. “You make quite a good argument. You ever think of just leaving to become a fancy lawyer or something?” 

Davey smiled and shook his head. “Nah. Not really my thing.” 

“No? Not even with your homeschooling?” 

“I didn’t actually get that much.” 

“Hey, most people would be lucky just to get the teaching you got.”   
Davey turned to him. “Would you be one of those people?” 

“Well…” Jack shrugged. “I know some stuff. But Jojo, Race and Specs are the only people on our ship who can read, and Crutchie’s alright at maths, and Albert’s pretty damn good at mechanics and such but--” 

“Wait a minute,” Davey interrupted. “You’re illiterate?” 

“I…” Jack started, and sighed. “Yeah.” 

“But how… I mean, you can read star charts, can’t you?” 

“My old man taught me,” Jack said proudly. “That, and how to tell what’s good junk and what’s bad. But that’s pretty much it.” 

Davey was silent for a moment, thinking. “You know…” he said slowly. “Once we’re out of this mess... I could probably teach you. If you want, of course.” 

Jack grinned. “Yeah. I’d like that.” 

“Yeah?” Davey was smiling too. “Okay. Alright. I’ll do it then.” 

“Wait,” Jack made a face. “Am I gonna have to read a lot of boring stuff?” Davey laughed. 

“Not all books are boring,” he said. “Actually, I know a few about Earth you might like.” 

“Pssh, oh yeah? Like what?” 

“Well  _ The Great Gatsby _ , for starters.” 

“That old book you were talking about earlier?” 

“And then  _ Into the Wild,  _ you’ll really like that one, and Moby Dick’s a classic, you have to read that too.” 

“Davey,” Jack said, suddenly serious. “I’m not going to be able to ever get through a book named  _ Moby Dick.”  _

Davey rolled his eyes and shook his head in exasperation. “That’s immature.” 

“Immature is a word used by boring people to insult fun people.” 

“Hey,” Davey protested. “I’m not boring.” 

Jack snorted. “Yeah? Tell me your best joke.” 

Davey thought for a moment as he walked, tilting his head. A slow, almost wicked, grin spread across his face. “I’ve got one. I heard it a while ago, when Les and I were on an older planet. It’s kind of crude, though.” 

“Oh yeah? Tell me.” 

He shrugged, his cheeks flushing slightly. “Alright. But only if you promise to never tell anyone else what I said.”

“...Fine.” 

He cleared his throat. “I take the stairs like I take dick.” 

“Davey, what--” 

“Two at a time.” 

With a loud  _ crash! _ Jack dropped everything he was holding to the floor. He stared at the retreating back of the sudden stranger in front of him in shock. 

_ “ _ **_Davey!_ ** _ ”  _

The boy in question was doing his very best to hide a satisfied smile. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it comes... the dreaded hiatus. Blame it on work or school, but I've fallen behind a little in my writing. Don't worry, it should only last a day or two at the most, I just need time to get out some new content!   
> As always, thanks for everyone's support and I hope you enjoy!


	9. First Things First

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crutchie gets his chance at the Corona, Davey and Jack have a much needed conversation, and the Junkies have a feast

_You are never gonna get_  
_Everything you want in this world_  
_First things first_  
_Get what you deserve_

 

* * *

 

Crutchie was soaring among the stars, and he was soaring _fast._

He couldn’t contain an excited whoop of joy as he shot the accelerator of Race’s _Corona_ and spun sharply around. The space was so open, so _free,_ that, well, he could imagine this was what running through the fields on Earth felt like. There wasn’t quite a moving breeze that he could feel blowing his hair, and there wasn’t warm a glowing light that he could feel on his face, and there wasn’t any of an electric blue sky to ground him--but man, it was something.

“Hey Jack, you seeing this?” he called over the radio as he turned the ship in a tight loop.

“I’m seeing it,” the reply crackled with a laugh. “And so is Race.”

Back on the _Manhattan,_ Race and Jack stood at the window of an observation deck, their feet planted firmly on the ground--and how good it felt to say that. With the help of Medda’s supplies, and a few of Katherine’s agents, the Junkies had been able to fix almost every part of their ship. The gravity simulators had fortunately been restored, and their oxygen level replenished. All of their firepower had managed to survive the battles, and they even managed to open a corridor that led from the Deck to the dorms. The ship still wasn’t in perfect shape, but it came real darn close.

Race tipped his head back and took a big swig of a beer from Jack’s stash. The Captain had been pretty ticked off when he got back to find all his alcohol gone, and he assigned Race to cleaning duty for the rest of the solar month, but he let the Junkie keep his last unfinished bottle and that’s all that mattered, really.

“I’ll miss you, Ms. _Corona,”_ he said sadly with a motion to the vague shape of his ship in the distance.

Jack grinned. “Relax, there aren’t exactly a lotta things he can crash into.”

Race shook his head. “You never know what happens out there, Jack. You never know.”

“What do you think will happen?” Jack laughed. “He’ll crash into an alien?”

Race whacked him in the arm. “I ain’t stupid, I know those don’t exist.”

“I don’t know…” he said teasingly. “We’ve only colonized half the universe. Maybe there are aliens out there somewhere?”

“Please,” came the reply. “As if the human race isn’t weird enough. Remember that one guy we met with cat ears implanted on his head?”

Jack snapped his fingers. “Maybe that _was_ an alien!”

Race shook his head. “If there is aliens, they need to hurry up and invade us already. I’m sick of this shit.”

“Pulitzer?”

Race kicked at a screw on the ground. “Everyone.”

Jack gave him a concerned look. Race had been more subdued than usual lately, and Jack didn’t want to push... but they _were_ friends, and he felt it was sort of his duty to ask. “You okay?”

“Fine,” he muttered. Jack didn’t reply, but after a beat Race continued anyways. “I just--I can’t get him out of my head is all.”

“Spot,” Jack said. It wasn’t a question.

“Yeah.”

“Wanna…” Jack shifted uncomfortably. “Wanna talk about it?”

“Nah.”

“Okay.”

“Hey guys?” Crutchie’s voice crackled over the radio. “I’m kinda having my fun here. Not that this isn’t heartfelt, but can you save your sappy gay talks for another time?”

“Fuck you, Crutchie.”

They stood quietly as they watched Crutchie do loop-de-loops in the empty space, but the thing about Jack and Race’s friendship is that it was full of silences and they had grown so used to them that the quiet could never be uncomfortable.

“So what’s the navigation like on that thing?” Jack finally asked casually, gesturing to the ship. He knew he had cheered Race up when the boy puffed out his chest.

“I built it myself,” he said. “It’ll take you to any place in the whole damn universe.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, it’s simple too. You just gotta plug in the coordinates and the planet and it’ll bring up local UPS transmissions from nearby satellites.”

“That’s it?” Jack asked, surprised.

Race nodded. “Yeah, it’s real easy.”

“So…” Jack began, leaning against a railing, “Even someone who’s never piloted it before could use the system?”

Race gestured, “Just look at Crutchie.”  

A loud shout of joy came from over the radio as the ship in the distance spiraled up and up, and took a sudden nosedive, plunging into the depths of the darkness. Jack laughed and Race rolled his eyes.

“It ain’t _that_ fun,” he muttered.

Jack gave him a push against the arm and the boy shoved back good-naturedly as he tapped on the coms.

“Alright Crutchie, you gotta come back now. We need the _Corona_ to search through our junk stores.”

Coupled with much whining and complaining, Crutchie slowly flew the ship back to the port and handed the keys back. Race dramatically flung himself over the front of it, crying, “oh darling, I missed you! I’m so glad you’re back in one piece,” and Crutchie punched him in the shoulder.

“Come on boys,” Jack grinned. “Let’s hand the cargo bay over to the crew.”

 

* * *

 

A metal, oblong canister rested on Jack’s desk. It had an eerie glow to it, but one that wasn’t exactly visible--almost as if the inside was filled with LED lights, and there was _supposed_ to be an aura of color around it, but there wasn’t. It was hard to describe, but the air shimmered around the outline of the object and it left a trail of distorted transparency as Jack waved it through the air.

It had a seal on the top, and complex lining around each edge, and when it was set down, it naturally tilted slightly to the side. He had never seen anything like it before.

And it even _felt_ weird. There was this unnatural sensation in the pit of Jack’s gut anytime he touched it with his bare hands and over time, his eyelids began to grow heavier and heavier. This object was the kind of thing he had only heard of in fairytales, and indeed, it did have sort of a magic quality to it.

There was no doubt that this was the thing Pulitzer had been wanting. Whatever it was--some form of neon? An alien object? A small model of cryogenics?--it had felt important to Jack from the first moment one of his junking boys brought it to him after a few days of searching.

He hadn’t told Katherine yet. He didn’t know why, but something compelled him to stay silent. The object drew him in a way and he didn’t want to turn it over to the Resistance just yet.

But he still needed information about what it was, so he had called in the ship’s resident expert.

“Jack?” Davey said, knocking on the partially opened door to his office.

The Captain looked up from the canister. “Hi, yeah, Davey, come in.” The Junkie hesitantly pushed the door in further and took a slow step inside--and nearly gasped out loud at the sight.

The walls to Jack’s office were lined with rows and rows of metal sculptures. Little statuettes of animals, spaceships, planets, plants, and even small figures of some of the Junkies lined the shelves. They were all intricately carved with the tiniest details, and they were comprised of what looked like scraps of junk of all colors, shapes and textures.

“You made these?” Davey breathed as he leaned in to get a closer look.

Jack looked up from where he sat. “Yeah. It’s just a hobby.”

“You’re really good,” said the Junkie, tearing his eyes away and approaching the desk.

“It’s really no big deal,” Jack brushed off, though he couldn’t hold back a small smile. Davey shrugged, but didn’t argue. Instead, he sat down in a chair opposite Jack and leaned into it, looking around at all the sculptures glinting in the light when the canister caught his eye. He frowned and sat forward immediately.

“What is that?” he asked. “That what Pulitzer was looking for?”

Jack nodded and reluctantly handed the object to Davey. “You think you can figure anything out about it?”

The boy’s face changed as he took it, and traced around the curious thing. Jack knew what he was feeling: like all the energy had been suddenly been drained out of him.

“You know that feeling you get when you’re falling asleep,” Davey started absently as he twisted the can around to study it. “You’re right on the edge of teetering into dreamland, and suddenly your body jerks like the floor had been ripped right out from under you?”

Jack blinked. That was exactly the sensation he had felt when he touched the object for the first time. “Yeah…” he said slowly.

“It’s called a hypnic jerk. It happens when your muscles are relaxed and then they contract suddenly.” Davey experimentally tapped at the seal, but when he couldn’t open it he set the canister back on the desk. He shook his head for a moment, as if awaking himself from a trance. “The days in the satellite when me and my family were all exposed to the neon… I used to get those all the time. I didn’t understand what was happening to me at the time, but now I know.” He gestured to the canister. “That was the neon taking effect on my body.”

Jack moved away from the object in alarm. “There’s neon in there? Like, pure neon? Is it dangerous?”

Davey bit his lip. “I don’t think so, not in that small amount. The most we’ll feel is drowsiness. But… it’s weird.”

“What?” Jack prompted when he trailed off.

“It’s just… You see this… sort of, aura around the edges?” Davey brushed his fingers along the side, and the air around it was distorted. “Like what you see above fire? It’s a sign of plasma, but neon doesn’t usually have plasma with it.”

“What are you saying?” Jack asked cautiously as Davey withdrew his hand.

The boy took a deep breath. “I’m saying, Jack, I think this is it. I think this is the compound Pulitzer wants to use in his cryogenic chambers.”

Jack was frozen for a moment, unable to tear his eyes away from the small metal can on his desk that suddenly seemed large and imposing and infinitely more dangerous than what he had originally thought.

“This is it?” he repeated as he slowly stood up from his chair. _“This is it?”_

“Yeah,” Davey grimly said, and Jack ran his hands over his face.

“What do we do…” he muttered, turning away and facing out the window. “What now?”

“Shouldn’t we take it to Katherine?” Davey asked, rising as well. Neither of them felt any inclination to be close to the object.

Jack shook his head. “She’ll just hide it away, or destroy it so Pulitzer can’t get to it.”

“Yeah…” Davey said slowly. “That’s what she _should_ do.”

Jack turned to him, his agitated eyes glowing. “But Davey, this--We have a real _bargaining_ chip right here. We have to use it.”

“What--?” Jack’s implication dawned on Davey. “No. No--Jack, _no way._ It’s too dangerous. What if Pulitzer doesn’t agree to a deal? Then we would have delivered exactly what he wants right into his hands.”

“You said it yourself: this war was going to be dangerous,” Jack reminded him.

Davey’s eyebrows furrowed. “Yeah! I said _dangerous,_ not--not idiotic!”

“Oh what, you calling me stupid?” Jack shot back, then took a deep breath. He took a step toward Davey and dropped his voice. “Davey, listen. Pulitzer won’t ever stop. Not if we blow up a research station, not even if we blow up a _hundred._ Davey, this canister… if we could use it as a bargaining chip, we might be able to get him to restrict his expansion or--or something. We might actually make it out of this mess alive.”

Davey clenched his jaw and stared down at Jack. “I thought you were better than this,” he said lowly. “I thought you would be able to see the big picture, not be this selfish--”

 _“I’m trying to save my family!”_ Jack shouted at him, his voice cracking. “I’m trying to save my home! Davey, you don’t understand! These boys--they’re my whole life! I _can’t_ send them into a war, I can’t! _Maybe_ I’m being selfish and _maybe_ I’m being stupid but--the universe hasn’t done _anything_ for me, and I sure as hell don’t owe it shit! Why can’t I just take a deal and run, huh? Why do I have to be the one to sacrifice everything?!”

To his credit, Davey didn’t raise his voice, though he wanted to. Instead, he tightened his lips and looked Jack directly into his eyes. Davey, the rock, with a core of the hardest steel asteroid, he reached out--

And tore down the walls blocking his heart.

He placed a hand on Jack’s shoulder, unflinching as the Captain stared defiantly and desperately back at him.

“Jack,” he said softly. “You’re scared. I get it. You want a way out, I know, I’ve been there. I’ve been where it feels like you’re trapped in the corner and anything you do will only push you in deeper and all you want to do is escape. I know what it feels like to be afraid. But--Jack--you _can’t_ run. Sometimes in life, you don’t have another option--you just gotta seize the day, even if it does seem hopeless.”

Jack glared at the ground. “Hey,” Davey said, pushing so the Junkie was looking at him. “We _will_ be okay. You just need to have faith in your crew, in your brothers. Crutchie, Race--all of them. You saw how they fought during the battle of Harlem. They stared down the odds and _won,_ and you can bet your ass they’ll do it again. Jack. No one is going to die.”

Jack searched Davey’s eyes, and still again he found strength and resolve. The boy never seemed to falter, and damn did Jack have to admit he admired that determination. Yet again, he found himself trusting this boy, this stowaway, this stranger. Yet again, Jack was swayed by his words.

“You’re right,” he said slowly, nodding and taking a deep breath. “You’re right, Davey. I have to trust them. I _do_ trust them.”

Davey released him and exhaled, smiling. “We got this,” he said, playfully punching Jack’s shoulder. “So, we’ll take the canister to Katherine, and--”

“I’ll take it,” Jack interrupted. At Davey’s hesitation, he added, “What, after all that talk about trust, and you don’t trust me?”

“No, I do…”

“Let me take it. It’ll show the boys that I’m ready to fight for them.” Davey reluctantly nodded.

“Okay then,” he said, and Jack turned to go sit down again. He paused for a moment before he did though.

“You trust me?” he said, facing Davey again with a surprised smile.

Davey instinctually glanced away. “I--yeah. He forced himself to meet Jack’s eyes with a breath. “I trust you.”

Jack broke into a big shit-eating grin. “Really?” he said teasingly.

“Don’t make me say it again,” Davey replied with an eyeroll, though he couldn’t repress a twitch of the corner of his lips.

Jack held up his hands, “Alright, alright. But… just for the record. I trust you too.”

With those words, Davey let himself relax into a genuine smile and, for the first time, he felt like they were finally starting to click.

“Good to know,” he said, though his tone was far from sarcastic. They hovered for a minute in a small silence, each with words in their throat but lacking the courage to say them. Davey found himself yet again drawn to the sculptures--he just couldn’t take his eyes away from their marvelous intricacy and he could almost picture Jack at his desk, working up into hours he should be sleeping as he delicately twisted and bent piles of scrap into recognizable shapes, each figure attached to a specific memory that made him smile.

Finally, Davey looked away. “I guess I’ll be going,” he said, feeling as if he were somehow breaking the comfortable atmosphere.

There was a beat before Jack responded. “Okay. But--oh! Davey. Do you think you could do me a favor?”

“Sure,” the guy said. “What is it?”

“Could you give Race a bottle from my chair?”

Davey stopped. “For what, Jack?”

“I…” he looked away. “I owe him something. That’s all.”

Davey searched his eyes with furrowed brows. He was tempted to say something… but then, he just told Jack he trusted him, didn’t he? He needed to have faith in his friend.

His friend. His… _first_ friend.

Davey nodded slowly. “Okay. I’ll see you at dinner, then.”

Jack gave him a smile as he picked up the canister and gestured to him. “See ya.”

The Junkie turned and stepped through the door with mixed feelings of happiness, confusion, suspicion and...comfort. This ship, with all its crew, was beginning to feel like his new home. Maybe once all this was over...maybe he and Les could stay here. Maybe their days of wandering would finally be over.

Back in his office, Jack set the canister back down on his desk and stared at it grimly.

 

* * *

 

Mush’s cooking, on a good day, was decent. Mostly good enough to not make the boys be sick in their hats, and moderate enough so that Henry wouldn’t complain.

But today, the crew was excited. Today, _Medda_ had brought down food from her ship, along with a few of the Resistance agents and Katherine for a meal in celebration for finally fixing the _Manhattan._

Elmer and Albert had even worked to build a dining table big enough to fit all of them: a circular metal piece that spanned almost the entire room. They had made it out of broken bits of wall that had been blow off their ship, and the crew found it rather fitting to be eating on it. And, _damn,_ did the food look amazing. Fresh greens and whole-wheat pasta and even what looked to be _real_ chicken covered the table, and the Junkies, who had been living off freeze-dried dinners for quite a while, licked their lips in anticipation.

Katherine, in between Davey and Medda, raised her glass. “To the _Manhattan!”_ She toasted, and the crew took up the shout with a hearty thrust of their cups.

“To Katherine and the Resistance!” Davey added, and again they drank.

“And to Captain Jack,” Medda finished as they cheered for the last time. Race good-naturedly tipped back his bottle of beer.

“Hey…” Crutchie piped up suddenly. “Where is Jack?”

Sure enough, the esteemed captain was nowhere to be found. Davey and Race exchanged glances, asking each other over the table if they knew where he was. Neither did.

“He’s probably just working on something in his office and running late,” Davey said nonchalantly. “He’ll be here. In the meantime, dig in everyone!”

He didn’t need to tell them twice, and within seconds the table had erupted into chatter as plates were passed around from person to person. Davey found himself deep in conversation with Katherine about their upcoming mission plans; Medda, Crutchie and Les had all hit it off rather spectacularly and Medda was entertaining them with some of her crazy stories; Race and Albert were, as always, competing to see who could fit the most rolls in their mouth at a time (Albert won, but Race slapped him on the back as soon as he hit eight so they all came tumbling out and onto the table); Henry had a large plate full of food which he was happily scarfing down, and Mush was glaring at him with folded arms (“How come you don’t eat my food like that?” he asked. “Because,” Henry replied through a bite of fresh lettuce, “your food sucks.” Mush slapped him.); Specs, Mike and Ike were chattering away in complicated technobabble as Finch sat next to them, his eyes glazed over and his face blank until Jojo elbowed him and they started a new conversation completely devoid of large words; Romeo was over in the corner flirting with a couple of Resistance agents and, occasionally, Elmer; Buttons and Tommy Boy had started a small food fight, and were currently playing catch with an unattended chicken leg; and Smalls and Sniper sat next to each other just watching it all unfold.

“Hey Medda,” Henry asked through a mouthful as he pointed to a plate of meat. “Is this lamb?”

“Oh give it here!” Albert shouted, lunging for it. He grabbed a chunk and sank his teeth deep into it. “This is what I’ve always dreamed of…” he sighed as Race laughed at him.

“You really met a pirate?” Les asked Medda with his jaw wide open. She nodded.

“Sure did! He gave me this diamond ring right here.” Crutchie’s eyes gleamed as he saw the twinkling gemstone.

“That’s beautiful…” he whispered, and Medda laughed as she held it out to him.

“You’ve got quite a taste for the fine things in life young man. Ever consider working in entertainment?”

Crutchie shook his head abashedly. “I couldn’t…” She shook his finger at him.

“You shouldn’t write it off so quickly. It makes quite a bit of money!”

“I bet _you_ could work in entertainment.” Romeo winked at Elmer, who hit him in the shoulder.

“Don’t you ever get tired of chasing people you can’t get with?” Finch piped up from his conversation with Jojo.

“Hey now,” Romeo countered. _“Someone_ has to take Hot Shot’s place.” Smalls and Sniper shared a look and could barely restrain their laughter.

Davey paused what he was saying as Tommy Boy flung his mashed potatoes from his spoon and accidentally landed it in the middle of Mike and Ike. The twins turned, grinning evilly, and began constructing a catapult out of celery.

“They’re a good bunch,” Katherine said, smiling.

“Yeah they are,” Davey agreed. “I just wish…”

Katherine put a hand on his. “I know,” she said, and it was a moment before either of them spoke again.

“So what do you make of it?” Davey asked finally, clearing his throat. “The canister. I’m worried about the seal--I don’t know how long it will hold. Maybe we could do a drop-off at the nearest white dwarf and be rid of it.”

“What are you talking about?” Katherine stopped him, confused.

Davey frowned. “Jack hasn’t dropped off the neon canister yet?”

Katherine shook her head. “I don’t--what canister?”

“You know,” Davey said, vaguely aware of a low churning in his gut and a buzzing around his head. “The can of neon. The thing Pulitzer wanted.”

“You found it?” Katherine asked, her eyes lighting up.

“Jack didn’t tell you?”

“No. Why? When did you guys find it?”

Davey thought back to their conversation in Jack’s office, how the Captain had wanted to tell Katherine himself, how he longingly looked at the canister on his desk, how he had protested so vehemently…

“That was more than a few hours ago…” he said, then stood up and cleared his throat.

“Excuse me!” he shouted. The chatter died out. Mike and Ike paused in the middle of loading their potato cannon. “Has anyone heard from the Captain in the last few hours?”

No one answered, but they all shook their heads.

Davey pushed away from the table.

“Wait!” Katherine called. “Davey!” She chased after him, as Race and Crutchie exchanged glances and followed them too.

“What’s going on?” Les asked Medda. She patted his hand worriedly.

“Everything’s alright,” she said, but her tone was unconvinced.

Davey raced down the halls of the _Manhattan,_ and banged open the door to Jack’s office, Katherine close behind.

He wildly looked around, but the room was empty. There was an open spot on his desk where the canister had laid.

 _“Why can’t I just take the deal and run?”_ Jack’s words floated intrusively in Davey’s mind.

“Damn it, Jack,” he muttered, rummaging through the Captain’s drawers and sincerely hoping he was overreacting. But the canister was nowhere to be found.

“What?” Katherine asked. “What’s happening?”

“Where’s Jack?” Race asked as he barged into the room, with a slightly breathless Crutchie.

“Race!” Davey said, grabbing the Junkie’s shoulders. “Where do you park your _Corona?”_

“My…?” Race was confused for a second, but his eyes widened as realization dawned on him. “Beta Port.”

Davey pushed past him and sprinted out the office, Race and Katherine right at his heels.

“Come on guys,” Crutchie panted, turning to follow them. “Why can’t we just turn gravity sims off again? I hate running.”

The four of them rushed down to the Beta Port, and Davey slammed down the button to raise the door.

The large metal garage door groaned open and Davey anxiously bounced on the balls of his feet. “Please Jack, come on, come on, Jack, please let it be there…”

The mechanics stopped. Davey cursed. Race pounded the wall next to him. Crutchie felt himself deflate.

The _Corona_ was missing. And so was Jack.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone for your patience! Hope you enjoyed :)
> 
> EDIT: Uh yeah. There's no way I can write myself out of this one with one chapter left. So... for the fans of this work, happy day! I'm gonna add a few more chapters.   
> As you can tell I'm kind of making this up as it goes along.


	10. Do I Dare Disturb the Universe?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Um...   
> Yeah.

_Do I dare_

_Disturb the universe?_

_In a minute there is time_

_For decisions and revisions_

_which a minute will reverse._

 

* * *

__

_ “Fuck!”  _ Davey shouted as he kicked the metal wall next to him. Crutchie eyed him.

“What does this mean?” Katherine asked quietly, her eyes fixed on the empty port. 

“We found the thing Pulitzer wants. It was a canister of the neon compound he was going to use for his cryogenesis. But Jack…” he pulled at his hair. “Jack wanted to  _ bargain  _ with it. He wanted to cut a deal with Pulitzer. I--I tried to convince him, I didn’t think he would--” 

“Can you blame him?” Race cut in bitterly. “Me? I don’t want to fight in no war. But…” His voice lowered in pitch. “Why’d he have to go and leave like that?” He glared at the ground. He had been down this road before, he just couldn’t believe it would happen again. And with  _ Jack  _ of all people. 

Davey clenched his jaw for a moment, deciding what to do. “Race…” he said slowly. “Is your com system still working on the  _ Corona?”  _

“I… yeah it should be.” 

Davey stalked out of the room, the other three jumping to go follow him. He went straight to the ship’s local communications port and flicked a couple switches before jamming his thumb on the button. 

“You think you can convince him to come back?” Crutchie asked, his voice trembling. 

Davey shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t even know how far away he is... but I can try.” 

The radio crackled to life, and Davey leaned over the microphone. “This is the  _ Manhattan  _ hailing the  _ Corona.  _ Jack? You out there?” 

Static. 

“Come on Jack. It’s your crew. Pick up!” 

Still nothing. 

Then-- 

_ “Hey Davey.”  _

They all jumped on the microphone at onces. 

“Jack what the fuck--” 

“You can’t just leave us like this--” 

“--Come back, please Jack--” 

“--You better not hurt my goddamn ship--” 

“Jack…” Davey said quietly after they had all shouted their part. “Why are you doing this?” 

_ “Look, Davey, I’m sorry--”  _ came the reply, and once again anger settled over his shoulders. 

“Jack, I trusted you!” It just wasn’t  _ fair-- _ he had finally brought his wall down and for what? To be betrayed? “How could you be so stupid, huh? Come back, we’ll work it out. Your plan  _ won’t work!”  _

“ _ It’s better than fighting a war we’re bound to lose!”  _ Jack shot back through the radio, and a million miles away, he ran a hand through his hair. 

“Davey… I’m sorry,” he said, and  _ god  _ could he see Davey’s face, upset and angry in his mind and it killed him. “I need to do this.” 

_ “You know what, Jack?”  _ A response came through the speakers, except it wasn’t Davey, it was Crutchie.  _ “We’re all sick and tired of your lone-wolf bullshit. You aren’t the only one sacrificing something, you know. This is a choice  _ we  _ made, and what gives you the right to ignore that?”  _

“Crutchie…” Jack said, at a loss for words. “I--” 

_ “You just left us! What kind of Captain are you--?”  _

_ “Do it, Jack,”  _ Race interjected suddenly, his voice grim and surprisingly steady.  _ “I don’t want to let these boys risk their lives either. If you think you have another solution… then do it.”  _

_ “Race!” _ Davey shouted at him, but Katherine piped up too.

_ “What’s done is done. He’s already out of our range, and he’s not going to come back. Might as well sit back and watch what happens. Just… Jack. Promise us something.”  _

“What? Yeah--anything,” he forced himself to speak, shocked at the sudden change of heart from two of his friends. 

_ “Be careful. Don’t do anything too risky.”  _

Race added,  _ “Promise you’ll win.”  _

Crutchie,  _ “Promise you’ll never leave us again.”  _

“I promise,” he said sincerely, then hesitated. “Davey?” 

_ “Promise you’ll come home,”  _ Davey added after a pause, a twinge of reluctance evident in his voice even through the radio. He didn’t like it, Jack knew that. But the Captain clenched his jaw and nodded, even though he knew they couldn’t see him. 

“I will Davey. I will.”

 

* * *

 

“This is our target.” 

Katherine pulled up a schematic on the screen behind her: a spherical structure that revolved around the neutron star it drew its energy from. It was hollow in the middle, but the outermost layers were brilliantly thick and fortified, and the whole thing perfectly fit the stereotypical image of a villain’s lair--if the villain was incredibly high-tech, rich and head of the largest industry in the universe, of course. 

“That’s a goddamn planet,” Romeo whispered, eyes wide. 

“It’s World Headquarters, and it holds one of Pulitzer’s last research stations.” She pointed to a section above the star. “Right here.” 

With a wave of her arms, the map zoomed out to show a smattering of small dots that surrounded the station. “These are Resistance ships and that--” she pointed to a rather large dot near the back“--is the  _ Manhattan.  _ You’ll be in charge of defense. You’ll be stopping any of Pulitzer’s patrol ships from reaching us from behind. It’s not a particularly dangerous assignment, but…” She paused and looked each of the Junkies in the eye. “You will be seeing some action.” 

“That’s the only action Tommy Boy’ll ever get!” someone hooted from the back, and Tommy Boy whipped around with his fingers balled tight in a fist as a few Junkies tried and failed to hide their laughter. 

“You want to fight?” he threatened. “Let’s go, right now!” 

“Calm down, TB,” Albert said nonchalantly. “You don’t have to get so hot-headed. We all know it’s true.” He high-fived Race. 

“Anyways.” Katherine raised her voice above the jeers. “I take it you all know how to use the guns on your ship?” 

“Hell yeah, we do!” Finch whooped amidst other shouts of agreement. 

“Good,” she nodded. “We’ve restocked your supplies and ammunition, so you won’t be in any danger of running low. But--we do recommended turning off your gravity simulators for the fight. Because we’re so close to the neutron star, you’ll be experiencing upwards of 3 g’s. Trust me when I say you’ll be fine without the sims.” 

Mike whistled and Crutchie groaned. “Guess I won’t be walking much,” he complained. 

“That’s alright Crutch,” Elmer reassured him, patting him on the shoulder. “You’re a fine gunner anyway. We wouldn’t have you doing anything else.” Les nodded next to him, and Crutchie couldn’t help but smile. 

“Well alright then,” he said. 

“3 g’s?” Davey asked, frowning. He folded his arms. “That’s a lot of pressure.” 

Katherine shrugged. “Well it’s a phase-three star. Practically a black hole.” 

“Can’t we just wait until Pulitzer’s base gets sucked in?” Henry piped up. “Skip this whole fighting mess altogether?” 

“I wish,” she sighed. “Unfortunately it’ll be a couple hundred thousand years before the base is in any real danger, and we can’t exactly wait that long.” 

“Yeah,” Buttons laughed, elbowing Henry. “Don’t ya know your basic astrophysics?” 

He pushed back. “I’m just asking the questions here. Like, when are Davey and Jack gonna hook up?” 

Davey sputtered as Race doubled over in a burst of laughter. “Excuse me?!” 

“Speaking of which,” Les interjected. “Where is Jack?” The Junkie’s around him nodded. Davey supposed he should be grateful that their attention span was about as big as a goldfish.  

The four exchanged a glance, silently debating who should answer that. Finally, Katherine answered. “We sent Jack ahead of us on a separate mission. He’ll meet us once we get there.” She didn’t mention that he would probably be on the wrong ship once they found him though, nor did she add the  _ ‘hopefully’  _ that she so wanted to put on the end of that sentence. 

Davey nodded, trying to convince himself that she was right: that Jack would make it out alive before the real fighting started. 

Fortunately, the Junkies seemed satisfied with her answer and the meeting got back on track shortly. 

Their instructions were simple enough, unlike some of the more complicated maneuvers the Resistance agents had to perform. Their goal was to get in, set some charges, and get out, blowing up the lab behind them. It seemed fairly straight-forward, but unfortunately stealth wasn’t an option. They’d be fighting the whole time. 

Katherine dismissed them after the third time the her instructions were interrupted in favor of a friendly roasting session, and the boys got back to fooling around on the Deck. 

“You really think this will work?” Davey asked her quietly as he watched Les shoot Finch’s slingshot. 

“It will work,” Katherine answered firmly. “Any update from Jack?” 

He shook his head. “We lost contact with him a hour ago. He’ll be reaching the Headquarters right about now, if he made it that far.” 

“Don’t say that,” she said sharply. “He made it.” 

“You have faith in him?” Davey asked her. 

“I do,” she responded immediately. “I had my doubts at first, but… getting to know him, I realized that he’s got the wit and the determination to outlast just about anything.” She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. “Do you?” 

Davey clenched his jaw. “I did. Now… I’m not sure.” 

It was true, and he couldn’t be blamed for it either. For the first time, Davey had actually took down his barriers and let someone in. He had fully  _ trusted  _ someone, and couldn’t repress a feeling of belonging when he was trusted too. He had finally made a friend, and then not even a couple hours later, that friend had left him. Trust wasn’t something Davey really knew anything about. He didn’t think he even trusted  _ Les.  _ Believed in him? Yes. Loved him? Fully. But if he was in the middle of a dangerous situation and Les was the only person who could save him, would he trust him? Davey was ashamed to admit the answer was no. 

But maybe that could have changed. The Junkies--they were a reliable crew. Sure, they loved to mess around, but when it came down to it, they really came through. They had even accepted Les in as one of their own without any question. Maybe they could have been a family. 

But then Jack had to go and  _ leave-- _

“Davey,” Katherine said gently, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Trust… it isn’t a one time thing. It’s not a ‘I trust you to do this one thing and that’s it’. Trust is forever. Jack left us, and he lied about it. But that isn’t enough to break  _ true  _ trust. If you really have faith in him, then you’ll believe that he’ll come back. You’ll believe that he can succeed.  _ That’s  _ what trust is.” 

Davey pondered her words. 

_ “Promise you’ll come home,”  _ he had told Jack. And Jack said,  _ “I will Davey. I will.”  _ There was conviction in his voice. Strength. Determination. And in that moment, Davey had believed that he would. 

Is that what trust felt like? 

He thought maybe it was.

 

* * *

 

“Um… guys?” Specs stuck his head in the room where Katherine and Davey stood an hour later, going over their plan yet again. “There’s…” his voice faltered. “Something.” 

“Could you be more specific?” Davey asked patiently, looking up from where they worked.

“It’s something,” Specs repeated nervously, and hurriedly ran out the door. 

Davey and Katherine exchanged a look, then took off after him down the hall. 

They chased him all the way to the Deck, and were met by the worried and anticipating faces of the crew. They ran up next to Race, who had gritted his teeth and was fixated on the Deck’s window. 

Davey followed his gaze, and swore.

What once had been open and empty space, thick blackness stretched out for miles on end, was now resembling something similar to the asteroid field they had so recently escaped. Millions and millions of ships, loaded with artillery and tracking systems, and large, roaring engines were approaching the  _ Manhattan  _ and the  _ Bowery _ slowly, like a tidal wave of enemy forces. 

“How did they get so close without us noticing?!” Davey demanded of Albert. The boy jumped as his name was called. 

“I--I don’t know. Cloaking?” 

“No one has cloaking that advanced,” Davey countered. 

“Pulitzer does,” Race said hollowly, a bead of sweat dripping down the side of his face. 

“We’re all alone here,” Crutchie muttered. “We’ll never make it out alive.” Feeling like it was the only thing he could do, Davey moved over to him and grabbed his shoulders. 

“Hey,” he said, forcing the boy’s eyes away. “Hey, look at me. We  _ will _ survive this, you got that? I just--I need all of you to focus!” He turned to the rest of them. “I need the crew that took on the Delancey and won! I need the crew that was prepared to fight Pulitzer on his  _ own terf!  _ All of you, I need you to snap out of it,  _ and do your jobs!”  _

One by one, the Junkies broke their gaze and met his eyes. One by one, they nodded and, one by one, they tightened their fists and clenched their jaws. 

“Specs!” Davey called. “How much time do we have before they’re in range to fire on us?” 

The Junkie grabbed at a computer screen. “About five minutes!” 

“Alright,” Davey muttered. “Alright, alright, alright. Here’s what we do. Katherine,” he said, turning to her. “First off, we need to get out of here. Does the  _ Bowery  _ have hyper-space engines?” 

She set her jaw and nodded. “Yes. You’re thinking--?” 

“A leash,” he finished. “We’ll at least be able to get some distance between us and Pulitzer’s ships. Get up to the  _ Bowery  _ and ready your ship. If all of Pulitzer’s forces are here right now, we can hit him at the base now. It’ll be empty.” 

“You’re right,” she said slowly. “I’ll send out the signal to our fleet and tell them we’re attacking now. I’ll call when we’re ready…” She cracked a smile. “Captain.” Then, Katherine turned and sprinted back down the hall. Seconds later, they could hear the hydraulics of the space elevator shut. 

“Alright Junkies,” Davey said, turning to the crew. “We’ve done this before, and we’ve done it in worse conditions. You all know what to do.” 

With a resounding chorus of affirmations, the Deck was abuzz with the crew all running to their positions. Half of them broke off to run towards the gunner decks, and Davey caught Les’ arms just before the kid could leave. 

“Where do you think you’re going?” he asked with narrowed eyes. Les met his gaze determinedly. 

“To kick some Pulitzer ass!” he replied, and broke away from his brother. Shocked, Davey started after him, but Les was already halfway down the hall. 

“Who--? Les, just be careful!” he called out. 

“Don’t worry about him,” Tommy Boy laughed, following him. “He’s a tough kid.” 

Davey frowned. “I know that…” he muttered. “He’s  _ my  _ brother.” 

Race came up next to him, his face rather pale. “Davey… I have a bad feeling about this.” 

“We’ll be fine,” Davey said, brushing him off. “We’ve flown on a leash before.” 

“Yeah,” Race responded. “Don’t you think we’re pushing our luck?” 

Davey fixed him with a stare. “Race,” he said evenly. “We don’t exactly have another option. Either you come up with a better idea, or you help us.” 

“You’re not my captain,” Race answered stubbornly, but he turned and went to the controls anyways. 

“I’m very aware,” Davey said to himself. “Trust me.”    
  


* * *

 

Pulitzer, to his credit, looked almost exactly how Jack had pictured him. 

Smug, old and white, with a neatly trimmed goatee that curled up around the edges. He was sharply dressed in a blazer and had a presence so imposing that made Jack feel small and almost unimportant. Pulitzer took up the whole room, even though there were about ten other people in it (Jack and several mean-looking guards with guns) and the ceiling was higher than anything he’s ever seen before. 

“Captain Jack Kelly,” he boomed, his voice echoing around the metal walls of his grand office. “I’ve heard of you. Commander of the  _ S.S. Manhattan,  _ correct?” 

“Yeah,” Jack said coldly, pulling his arm away from one of the escorts. “And you’re Pulitzer, also known as the biggest asshole in the universe.” 

“You flatter me,” he replied apathetically. “Now, I’ve got quite a bit on my plate today, and I’m sure you’re not drowning in leisure time either--you know, since you have to constantly work to survive. So. What can I do for you?” 

“I’ve got a proposition,” Jack sneered, and took a shaky step forward. He hadn’t picked up on it before, but his body seemed abnormally weighted down. He wondered if it was a side effect of spending so much time close to the neon, but this heaviness seemed different. It was more powerful, so much so that Jack even swayed on his feet a bit. 

“You like that?” Pulitzer said, noticing Jack’s uneasiness. He gestured out the window of his office, where they could both see the remnants of a brilliant white star that rested in the center of The World’s headquarters. “A phase-three neutron star. Holds quite a bit more gravity than you’re used to, I’m sure.” 

Jack followed his gaze, his eyes narrowing. He thought about the attack that was supposed to take place later that day, and hoped Davey wouldn’t have to go anywhere near the star. He had been functioning fine on the  _ Manhattan’s  _ gravity sims, but who knows what this strong of a force would do to him?

“It’s very pretty,” Jack said sarcastically, turning back to Pulitzer. “But I’m not here to stargaze.” 

“Right,” the man said, taking a seat behind his desk. “You’re here with a ‘proposition.’ Let’s hear it.” 

Jack leaned over the wood, and though he was the one looking down on Pulitzer now, he still couldn’t help but feel like an ant threatening a boot. 

“I happen to know I got something’s you want. And I’m willing to give it to you, on one condition.” 

Pulitzer sat forward, his eyes gleaming. “You have my neon, don’t you boy?” 

“I’ve got your precious chemicals,” Jack sneered. “But--” 

“Where is it?” the man interrupted, slowly standing up. “Tell me!” 

Jack held up a hand, somewhat satisfied by Pulitzer’s reaction. “Now, hold your horses. You’ve got to promise me something first.” 

“Alright, what is it?” he asked. 

“I want full immunity for me and my boys. We can go junking anywhere and everywhere we wants, and you can’t touch us.” 

“Deal,” Pulitzer said immediately, but Jack stopped him. 

“That’s not all. I want Davey and Les included in that too. They’re with us.” 

Pulitzer narrowed his eyes. “The Jacobs boys? I’m not sure I can do that, Jack. They are the first people to have been exposed to such as large amount of neon in history. They’d make valuable test subjects.” 

Jack’s stomach churned at the thought of Davey and Les locked up like animals and being experimented on. “They’re included, or you won’t have anything at all to research.” 

Pulitzer considered it. 

“Come on, Joe,” Jack urged. “It’s too good a deal to turn down.” 

“Fine,” the man finally said. “I accept.” 

Jack spat on his hand. “Shake on it, then.” 

Pulitzer made a face.  “That’s disgusting.” 

“That’s just the price of doing business,” he responded, and after another moment of hesitation, Pulitzer too spat in his hand and shook. 

“Where is the neon?” he asked immediately, wiping his palm on his jacket. 

“It’s on my ship,” Jack told him. “I’ll give it to you once you let me out of here.” 

“That’s alright,” Pulitzer said, waving his hand, and two guards came up behind Jack and grabbed him. “I’m sure my team can find it without your help.” 

“What? Hey!” Jack shouted, pulling away from the guards, but his body was so heavy he couldn’t move as well as he normally could. He cursed, still unused to the stronger gravity. “We had a deal, Pulitzer!” 

“You really should have signed a contract,” the man replied off-handedly as he sat back down at his desk. “It’s more binding. Besides, I don’t have time to play with you. I have to prepare for your friends.” 

Jack froze. “What?” he said quietly. 

Pulitzer looked up at him in a feigned surprised. “Oh yes. You thought I didn’t know about your little rebel plans? I’m the most powerful man in the universe, Jack. I can’t have a direct attack on my base succeed. As of now, my forces are out there, leading your ship and crew right into a trap.” 

“They’re not--the Resistance isn’t--what attack?!” 

He sighed. “You’re not a very good liar, Captain. Take him away.” 

“No!” Jack shouted, fighting as the guards started to drag him away. “Pulitzer--there ain’t a person in this room that don’t know you stink! We had a deal!” 

“Hand him over to General Snyder in the Refuge. Maybe that will teach him a lesson or two about respecting his elders,” Pulitzer waved, and as Jack was pulled out of the room the doors slammed shut on the image of the man’s wicked grin. 

“ _ Pulitzer!”  _

 

* * *

 

“The leash’s attached, Davey!” Mike shouted. “We’re all set to go!” 

“Perfect,” he called back. “Tell Katherine we’re to fire up their engines, and everyone buckle in!” 

The crew on the Deck hurriedly strapped themselves into their chairs, and Race took his position at the controls. “We ready?” he asked, as he tightened his harness. 

“Ready!” Ike confirmed, taking off his headset and tightening his belt as well. 

“Okay Race,” Davey nodded to him. “Make sure we don’t crash into the  _ Bowery.  _ We can’t afford to take a hit before we even go into battle.” 

“Piece of cake,” Race replied, cracking his knuckles and gripping the levers. 

The Deck rumbled as the  _ Bowery’s  _ hyperspace engines blasted with a roar. Blue flames whipped above the large window in front of them, and the  _ Manhattan  _ began to move. 

“Here we go!” Crutchie shouted, his hand tightening on his chair. 

The light from the stars in front of them stretched into long lines as they were pulled backward with a force so big half of the Junkies were bent over in their seat. Davey watched through cracked eyes as the wall of Pulitzer’s ships began to shrink smaller and smaller until the ships on the sides started to disappear more and more until-- 

Until it looked like there was only one ship in front of them, with a large mechanism on the top of it that sprayed light in all directions. He recognized the waves from all the way back when he was on the  _ Singer.  _ That wasn’t any old ship out there, he realized with a jolt--that was  _ holographic  _ tech.

“What the hell?” Davey muttered, his words ripped out of his throat as the  _ Manhattan  _ cracked the sound barrier and all his thoughts were lost. 

He never really had a sense of how fast a hyperspace engine could go, but as they were dragged along behind them he started to gain a better appreciation. Race was pale and sweating in concentration, yanking the controls back and forth to keep them just from touching the  _ Bowery.  _ Even the smallest of brushes at this speed could tear their entire hull off. 

Davey supposed he never realized just how damn good of a pilot Race was either, as he watched the Junkie maintain a distance so close they wouldn’t lose any speed, all while deftly dodging the sudden obstacles that appeared out of nowhere as they shot through the heavens. 

And finally, with a  **_crack,_ ** they left the sound barrier, and the  _ Bowery  _ and the  _ Manhattan  _ came to a stop--

In the middle of a warzone. 

“ _ Race _ !” Davey shouted, as a sudden missile hurtled in their direction. Without wasting any time, the pilot slammed a lever down and the  _ Manhattan  _ shot to the side just as the projectile flashed by them and careened into a silver Resistance ship. “Get to your stations!” he bellowed at the top of his lungs, and the boys all unbuckled their seat belts. 

But they couldn’t get out of their seats, and Davey realized that he too was struggling to move. They had reached the World’s headquarters, and the gravity sims combined with the pull of the neutron star was dragging them all down to the floor. 

He pushed through the gravity, groaning as he reached for the radio. “Katherine!” he shouted as a missile Race couldn’t avoid struck the side of their ship and threw it to the side. “What’s happening?” 

Static overcame the signal, and he could just barely make out her response.  _ “It’s an ambush! We’re trapped!”  _

_ “Shit,”  _ Davey swore. “What do we do?” 

_ “Stick to the plan!” _ came the reply, but she was cut off with another explosion. 

“Okay,” Davey said, composing himself. “Okay. Mike, Ike! Get those gravity sims off!” 

“On it!” they called, crawling over to their dashboard and flicking a few switches. After a minute, Davey found that he could breathe a little easier, and some of the Junkies were starting to get up and run towards the gunner decks. 

Next: “Race! Get us to the back! We’re in charge of defense, we need to provide cover for the fleet.” 

The pilot, already straining, couldn’t even reply as he lifted the controls and slowly the ship started to move. 

“We can do this,” Davey said aloud, mostly to reassure himself. “We  _ will  _ win.” 

It was hard to convince himself though, as a flaming Resistance ship spun out of control in front of them and crashed into a part of the headquarters. 

Davey’s head started to spin, and his vision began to grow blurry as cold rushed down his face. The Deck began to sway. 

“No,” he whispered, gripping the arms of the Captain’s chair. “Not now.” 

“Davey!” Specs shouted to him. “What do we do?” 

“Cover them!” he forced out, but another hit knocked them all to the ground. Red light flooded the Deck, and alarms began to blare. A fireball exploded right in front of them: yet another Resistance ship blown to pieces. 

He shook himself, trying to focus, but all the blood had drained out of him and the world was muffled. The voice of the Junkies, the sound of the explosions, the shouts, the yells, the tearing of metal, they were all blocked by a layer of molasses and Davey struggled to draw his next breath. 

“Come on…” he urged himself, but the words were stuck in his throat. His eyelids began to drop. “I… Jack…” he whispered. “Jack…”  

The last of his strength left him, and the world fell to black. 

 

* * *

 

The window in Jack’s room was blocked by iron bars, and he gripped them tightly as he watched the carnage unfold in front of him. 

“No…” he whispered helplessly. Pulitzer’s fleet had the Resistance surrounded, and out there, in the middle of the fight, he could just barely make out the  _ Manhattan  _ careening to the side under the weight of an explosion. He could nothing to stop it. 

He had failed. And now they were going to lose. 

Jack never even said goodbye.

 

**End of part two**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, there goes part two!   
> Thanks again for everyone's support!


	11. And Fired

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The battle continues   
> *Nervous laughter*  
> Tag for cliffhanger?

_Am I only living, living to survive?_   
_Shake it off but I've lost the drive_   
_Just let me be just let me be_   
_Let me be, okay_

* * *

 

Katherine slammed against her desk, catching herself before she could tumble all the way to the floor. Blood dripped from a gash in her cheek and sparks showered from the ceiling as alarms wailed and broken bits of metal crashed down around her. 

They were being destroyed. 

“Alpha squad, circle around and defend the bomber team! We need to get those charges planted!” she shouted into her headset. A single voice replied in affirmation. 

She pulled herself back up, ordering a couple agents around her to move the ship, to fire in a different direction, to raise or lower shields. She was a whirlwind of commands, and she’d be lying if she said she wasn’t utterly exhausted by it, but she pushed through. 

“Delta squad is almost out!” someone shouted to her. 

“Tell Gino and his crew to take their place,” she shot back instantly. “Asha, take--” Another explosion cut her off, rocking the Deck. “Asha! Fire at the heavy artillery! We need to stop taking hits like that!” 

One by one, problems surfaced, and one by one she fixed them. But soon her hands were crossed, running out of stoppers to plug the leaks. 

“We’re running low on ammunition!” an agent reported. 

“We lost the Delta squad” someone else called. 

“More ships inbound!” 

“Gamma squad is taking heavy fire!” 

“We’re locked on!” Katherine whipped around at that one, wildly searching their radar. Sure enough, one of Pulitzer’s ships had their cannons targeted at them. 

“Get us out of the way!” she screamed, but their pilot shook her head. 

“There isn’t enough room--!” Sirens wailed, warning everyone to take cover. 

“Hold on!” she called. “Brace for impact!” 

Suddenly, out of nowhere, a large hulking mass of a ship twisted to the side, its shields engaged, and blocked the cannons. The large, peeling red letters of the  _ Manhattan  _ filled their window as it rolled to the side and returned fire. They could feel the rumble as Pulitzer’s cannon pounded into the  _ Manhattan’s  _ defenses, but both ships were relatively unharmed.

“Alright Race!” Katherine cheered, grabbing her radio. “Thank you! How are you boys faring?” 

_ “Not very well, ma’am,”  _ Specs answered through the radio.  _ “Davey’s out cold, and our shields are nearly gone!”  _

“What do you mean, Davey’s out?!” she shouted, catching an agent that stumbled next to her as their ship rocked. “Never mind. Can you get over to our bomber squad? They need backup!” 

_ “Sure thing!”  _ he answered, and the  _ Manhattan  _ began to move to the south. 

“Ma’am,” said the agent she caught. “Should we pull out?” 

Katherine gritted her teeth as the ship rocked. “We  _ can’t,”  _ she said. “We’re too close.” 

“But…” the agent protested, her eyes darting in fear. “We’re losing  _ everyone.”  _

* * *

_  
_ Race was sweating, and his hands were beginning to cramp. It had only been thirty minutes of nonstop dodging and spinning, but the time stretched on and on and he was already starting to lose hope that they would ever make it out of this warzone. 

They took a particularly bad strike, and Specs flew past Race, slamming into the wall and falling to the ground. 

“Mike!” he shouted. “Get him!” In the five seconds he had taken his eyes off the battlefield, they had taken two more hits and the shields were starting to fail. They were defenseless now. 

He had been in battle before, certainly, but never this close. He was always the one in charge, behind the scenes. The one  _ telling  _ his ships where to go, not the one making ships go. Race knew he could handle the intensity, he’d been in worse situations, but he was by himself now and struggling to keep up. Every millimeter he turned, there was a projectile he had to dodge. He had to avoid the heavy artillery, had to roll back and forth to give the gunners a clear shot, had to ram into smaller ships, had to protect the Resistance’s fleet, and now that both Davey and Specs were unconscious, he had to give orders too. 

He was being ripped apart at the seams. He couldn’t do it anymore. 

“Ike!” he called. “Get Crutchie and Albert up here!” The Junkie nodded and took off, staggering down the hall as it jerked like a live animal. 

He just had to hold on until Crutchie and Albert could get here. They can help him. They can take control of all the little things he simply didn’t have the energy to focus on. 

But the thing was, none of them were  _ supposed  _ to be taking charge. Jack was supposed to be here, telling everyone what to do, and where to go. That’s what he was good at. But now he was gone. Maybe he had managed to convince Pulitzer to let them go, like Davey said he had wanted to. Maybe he was thrown in jail. Maybe he never even made it to headquarters. Maybe he was dead. 

Whichever way, he and the  _ Corona,  _ they were gone-- 

Race froze for the briefest of moments, costing them a severe strike to portside. The  _ Manhattan  _ careened to the side, crashing into a couple of Pulitzer’s smaller ships. They erupted into fire at the contact, and the rest scattered away. Race smiled grimly. That was one way to take them out. 

\--But the  _ Corona.  _ It had a tracker on it. Maybe they could use that. 

Ike raced onto the Deck, with Crutchie and Albert close at his heels. 

“Race!” Albert cried, seeing Race nearly doubled over at the controls. “What can I do?” 

“Take them--” Race managed to gasp, and without any hesitation, Albert grabbed the levers from him. Race unbuckled and practically fell out of his harness, which Albert quickly strapped himself into. 

Crutchie helped pull him up, and Race gripped his arm. “Crutchie,” he groaned, staring at the boy. “I need you… to listen. The  _ Corona…  _ I put a tracker in it. Jack--” 

Crutchie’s eyes lit up in understanding. “We can find Jack?” 

Race nodded. “The signals hooked up to the main control panel. Can you…?” 

“I’ve got it!” Crutchie replied immediately, leaning Race up against the wall and limping over to where he was pointing. “Mike, help me out!” 

Together, they tapped away on the panel. 

Race’s head lolled to this side, too weak to even move. He hated to admit, but the fight, the gravity, all of it had seriously taken a toll on his body. He didn’t know if he’d be of anymore use to them. 

Davey was out. Race was out. Half of their fleet was out. 

Maybe their only hope now was Jack. 

* * *

 

Finch cursed.

The boys down at the gunner docks had been kicking ass, sure, but since Crutchie and Albert left the tide was slowly changing. 

Down the hall he could hear shouts as Henry and Buttons destroyed a squad of Pulitzer’s fighter ships, and on the other side he heard Jojo curse as his gun was blown to pieces. 

The guns, equipped with a simple targeting system and several different settings, relied solely on jets of pure energy blasts, sometimes so strong that they could cut through even the thickest steel. The blasts were incredibly powerful and efficient, but the only downside is that they weren’t always perceivable by the human eye. It wasn’t rare to be startled by sudden strikes to the side of a ship as an enemy fired a stream of invisible projectiles. 

Albert, with the help of Mike and Ike, had built a detecting system that was able to register incoming blasts most of the time, but it was only about eighty percent effective and obviously of no use to Jojo, who had stomped down the hall toward Finch’s deck. 

“Hey,” he said glumly, plopping down on a small outcropping behind him. 

“You’re out, huh?” Finch asked casually as he blew another craft to pieces, as if they he had just lost a game of cards. 

“Yep. Those damn fighters is learning. I think they’re starting to target just the gunners now.” 

A shout as a fireball exploded on the side of the ship, and broken parts of a cannon hurtled past Finch’s window. 

“God  _ damn  _ it!” they heard Smalls scream. “They got me!” 

Finch gritted his teeth. The crew-- they weren’t exactly inexperienced when it came to firefights. Most of them could hit a target, and a few of them, like Crutchie and Sniper were  _ damn  _ good, managing to take out an entire squadron at one point... but Pulitzer’s forces simply outnumbered them. No matter how many ships they managed to shoot down, there were still more that would pop up and fight back, and it wouldn’t be long before they were overwhelmed. 

A few decks over, Tommy Boy and Les were scrambling to load their cannons. 

“Take that, asshole!” Tommy Boy hollered as their missile slammed right into their mark: an undefended ammo ship. Slowly, it began to turn and fly back towards some of the heavily armoured ships, leaving the squad closest to it out dry. 

“Yeah, go run for mommy!” Les laughed, and high-fived Tommy Boy. 

“Alright, go get another one,” he told the child, and Les eagerly ran back to their stash. 

Tommy Boy peered through the sights on the cannon, searching for another target. Pulitzer’s forces were scattered throughout the whole battlespace, bombers and fighters and stealth ships alike completely surrounding the Resistance fleet. 

He set the targeting systems on a nearby bomber and prepped the cannon. 

“You got it yet, Les?” he called, wondering what was taking the boy so long to get back. 

“Um, TB?” the kid replied, sticking his head in the room. “There aren’t any missiles left.” 

Tommy Boy whipped around. “Nothing?” He followed Les into the storage room, hoping maybe the kid had just missed a rack, but the shelves were empty. He was right, they were out of ammo. 

“Shit,” he cursed, pulling his radio from his belt. “Tommy Boy to the Deck. We’re out of missiles down here!” 

Only static answered him. He tried again. “Hello? Anybody up there?” 

Les tugged on his shirt, his eyes wide open. “My brother should have been on the radio. Is he--?” 

“I’m sure they’re okay,” Tommy Boy reassured him. “They’ve probably just got problems of their own they have to solve.” Les’ bit his lip, his innocence making the Junkie uncomfortable. None of the crew really had to deal with kids before. “Come on,” he said, taking the boy’s hand. “Let’s go see if we can help out anywhere else.” 

* * *

“Give me an update!” Katherine commanded of the nearest agent, her eyes fixed on the window to the battlespace. She winced as a ship closest to them caught fire and slammed into one of the Headquarter’s spires. “Make it good.” 

“We’re down to our last bomber ship!” answered an agent, and she grimaced. 

“I thought I said  _ good _ news.” 

“Ma’am,” he replied. “There isn’t any good news. We’re taking heavy losses, and enemy forces just keep coming! I don’t know--” he cut off. “With all due respect ma’am, we aren’t going to last much longer.” 

Katherine furrowed her brows and opened her mouth to respond, but she was cut off by an explosion outside the window. 

“ _ Manhattan’s  _ shields are gone!” another person reported, and sure enough the old junker ship careened to portside, it’s whole flank bursting into fire. 

Katherine lunged for the radio. “ _Manhattan,_ are you boys okay? Race! Specs! Can anyone hear me!” 

_ “That was a rough hit!”  _ Crutchie answered through a wall of static.  _ “We’re okay, but we can’t take much more of this!”  _

“Gamma squad’s taking heavy fire!” an agent shouted, and Katherine turned to deal with it, but another shout had her whipping around, and another and another and another until she was practically spinning on the spot, shouting out orders left and right and hoping they stuck. 

Her whole life she’d been the one plugging the leaks. When she worked for her father, she was in Management, wrapping up whatever loose ties Pulitzer had left behind with his not-so-legal dealings in the underworld. When she left, she worked on an entertainment ship in human resources, making sure all the guests were perfectly happy and content. When she moved on from  _ that,  _ she was a lower-level officer of the newly formed movement called the Resistance, and she was in charge of erasing all incriminating evidence from their under the table planning. Even now, though she was at the very top, she found herself being pulled apart at the seams. Make no mistake, years of doing this intense kind of work had left her  _ very  _ good at her job--but she was starting to wonder just how long she could keep doing it. 

And now they were in the endgame. The final battle, and her head was a lead weight on her shoulders and she was being ripped limb from limb and she couldn’t  _ think,  _ her words were tripping as they fell out of her mouth, and the whole universe was spinning and spinning and spinning and it was all too much, she couldn’t last much longer--

“What’s happening?” A hushed mutter stopped her in her tracks, and she zeroed in on it like a drone. She pointed at an agent sitting close to her, the one who was staring at the screen with his eyes scrunched up in confusion. 

“You,” she said, and the agent jumped. “What’s wrong?” 

He hesitated, looking back and forth between her and the map of the battlespace. “Well, ma’am, Pulitzer’s ships are… They’re…” 

“Yes?” she prompted, her strained tone quite snappish. 

“Well--they’re retreating.” 

“What?” She moved over to join him at the screen, and sure enough, the blue dots were slowly backing away from where the  _ Bowery  _ and the  _ Manhattan  _ were clustered. “What is this?” Out the window, as well, Pulitzer’s forces were either hovering or turning on their axis and straight up flying  _ away.  _ Katherine got a sinking feeling in her gut. 

“I guess we’re winning now?” the agent shrugged, and broke into a weary but hopeful smile. “Does this mean we get to go home now?” 

Staring into his eyes, Katherine was struck by how  _ young  _ he looked. They were all so young. All of her agents had come from broken planets with collapsed economies and degraded societies. Many of them had to fight just to eat every night, and some of the ones she had picked up were so thin they could barely handle the  _ Bowery’s  _ gravity simulators. And that was the thing that had pushed her over the edge: the people in charge, the rich, aristocratic businessmen, they had  _ let  _ this happen. They had willingly turned an oblivious cheek towards the starving planets, the ones that were  _ dying  _ just so the elite could pocket a few more pennies. And her dad was the worst one of all. 

She could clearly remember one year where the Aries System had closed their borders and trade was at an all-time low. The Pulitzer’s were fine; they had a self-sustaining base that could produce its own oxygen, water and food. Some of the planets weren’t so lucky: they had depended on regular shipments of oxygen to survive their brutal atmospheres. But the economy had fallen into a recession, and her father had decided that trading to the bankrupt planets wasn’t beneficial anymore. She had woken up one morning to news that the citizens of  Planet PA-432 had suffocated in their own homes, and when she asked Pulitzer if he had anything to do with it, he shrugged.  _ “What a shame,”  _ he had said as he casually scrolled on his tablet. Katherine had never been more disgusted with him, and they next day she packed all her things and left. 

The agents she had found, they were more than acquaintances or co-workers. They were her  _ family,  _ more real than she had ever known, and  _ they _ actually had souls. 

But the boy in front of her looked no older than twenty, and here she was sending them headfirst into war. 

Was she doing the right thing after all?

“Ma’am!” someone shouted for her, and the panic that lined the woman’s voice forced Katherine to tear her eyes away from the agent in front of her. 

“What is it?” she asked, running to the computer, and the agent jabbed her finger at the screen. 

“We’ve got incoming!” 

Katherine’s eyes widened, as she saw what was on the monitor, and sprinted over to the window. Pulitzer’s forces had all cleared the battlespace, and only the Resistance fleet was left, nervously hovering in anticipation. 

At first, there seemed to be nothing that filled the space between them and Pulitzer’s army. Then she saw it. 

A single ship slowly approached them from out of the darkness. It’s bay doors were barred open wide, the hull seemed to be thicker than the whole length of the  _ Bowery,  _ and to say that it was huge was an understatement. 

“Here comes the cavalry,” the agent grimaced, but Katherine couldn’t do anything but watch as the battleship drew nearer. She was vaguely aware that all chatter had died out in the room, and everyone had turned to stare out the window. 

“We’re dead,” someone gasped, and the weight of the universe collapsed her lungs. 

As the light from the neutron star was cast on it, Katherine couldn’t help but shake. The bay doors had given way to reveal a gaping maw of shadows from which a metal cylinder protruded, larger than anything she had seen before, and she knew right at that moment that the agent was right, that they would not survive a blast from this cannon. 

Someone sobbed. Someone screamed. Katherine clenched her hands until her fingernails broke the skin of her palms, but no amount of pressure could keep them from trembling. 

The great beast seemed almost to suck in all the stars around it as the cannon loaded, charged--

And fired. 

* * *

 

Jack could hear the noise of the battle from his cell and he was  _ not _ happy about it. 

He could hear explosions and the scream of metal as it tore and scraped, and the discharge of guns and cannons alike. He could hear the dying engines, the screech of ships as they caught fire and crashed. He could hear his friends fighting for their lives, and what was he doing? 

He was sitting on his ass. 

Jack kicked the wall as he let out a frustrated yell, and when he decided that kicking the wall wasn’t catharsis enough, he began to pound on it with both fists until his knuckles cracked and bleed. He hit it once more for good measure and swore before gripping the bars of his cell tight and shaking them. 

_ “Let me out!”  _ he shouted in rage, even though no one could hear him. “Please!” 

Of course, there was no answer, and Jack whipped away from them. How did it come to this? How could all of this have possibly happened? He longed for the mornings where he could just sit on the observation deck and wish for the stars. He longed for the days of his family and Crutchie and all the boys that made his life what it was. He longed for the days where his decisions didn’t come down to choosing between the fate of the universe and the fate of his brothers, where any risk he made  _ didn’t  _ lead to certain death for everyone he knew and loved. 

He gripped his hair and pulled, cursing. This was all his fault. That’s how it happened. It was his fault for involving his crew in the Resistance in the first place. That first day on the  _ Bowery,  _ he should have just taken Davey and run away, run as fast as they could. He should have never even considered it an option to join a war. 

But most of all, he shouldn’t have left them. It didn’t matter that he was trying to save them all. He failed, and now they were out there, probably dying, and he was to rot away in a jail cell for the rest of his life. 

At the very least, he should have died alongside them…

“How are you enjoying your stay, Jack?” a rough voice greeted casually, and Jack turned to meet the beady eyes of General Snyder. 

Jack stalked over to meet him. “Let. Me. Out,” he gritted through clenched teeth, but the General just laughed, a harsh, raspy sound. 

“Like the view?” he jeered, gesturing out the window. “You get front row seats to the death of the Resistance.” 

“They’re going to kick your ass,” Jack growled, but Snyder still played unfazed. “And then I’m going to bust outta here, and kick  _ your  _ ass, you greasy weasel.” 

The General held his hands mockingly in the air. “I’m so scared!” he mocked. “Oh Jack, please spare me!” He doubled over laughing. “No, that won’t happen. I reckon this battle will be over in--” he checked his watch, “--a few more minutes. Pulitzer’s finally pulling out the big guns.” He winked and Jack gripped the bars of his cell. 

“What are you talking about?” he asked, but Snyder just gave him a sneering smile and turned down the hall. “Snyder!” Jack shouted after him. “What are you talking about?! Snyder!!” 

* * *

 

Race lifted his head the third time Albert screamed his name. 

Blinking through blurry eyes, he groggily pushed himself up and leaned against the wall for support. 

Albert was still at the controls, pushing and pulling levers with expert skill, but still more clumsily and sluggish than Race could do--and they were paying for it. His hand slipped against the monitor as an explosion threw the  _ Manhattan,  _ and a broken edge of the metal sliced open the flesh of his palm. 

Race just stared at it as blood dripped to the floor. The crimson red was almost hypnotizing as it danced in the shadow darkened by the light of an explosion out the window…

“Race!” Albert called. “Get over here, I need your help!” 

Crutchie was gripping onto the side of the wall, a screen displaying a schematic of World Headquarters. He noticed Race looking at him.   
“We found your ship!” he called. “It’s over on the East side! Jack’s here!” Though he couldn’t help but feel a small weight ease off his shoulders, Race wondered if that was truly good news or bad news.

Either way, he hurried over to help Albert. He was still exhausted, but his apparent power nap left him with just enough energy to last another hour or two. The second his fingers touched the levers, the other Junkie fell back from it. 

“Thank god,” he moaned, slumped over the dashboard. His body rocked as another hit tossed the Deck. “We’re getting crushed out here.” 

“How long was I out?” Race asked him in alarm as he realized one lever was stuck, and there were now several sirens sounding all at once, alerting breaches in the side, low oxygen levels and incoming hits. Race deftly steered out of the way of a missile headed their way. 

“Twenty minutes,” Albert told him, before he collapsed on the ground next to Davey, where he closed his eyes and did not move again. 

The Deck itself looked like a warzone; Race’s blood was now smeared all over the controls, the bodies of Specs, Davey and Albert scattered out on the floor, and poor Crutchie clinging onto the monitor next to Mike for dear life. 

“We just need to hold on,” Crutchie was muttering over and over again, mostly to reassure himself. His eyes were squeezed tightly shut. “We just need to hold on…” 

Race gritted his teeth, a blip on the screen next to him warning that the back half of the  _ Manhattan  _ had just been blown off. They couldn’t hold on for much longer--he turned right into the face of an oncoming ship, and he cursed and yanked down on a lever, but it was stuck and he couldn’t move it and they were on the path to a head-on collision with one of the Pulitzer’s shipes--

“Race?” Crutchie said, pulling away from the wall on which he clung. “What’s that?” 

He pointed out into the battlespace, where a ship was lurking in the darkness, it’s bay doors slowly opening. 

Race’s stomach churned. He had seen a ship like that only once before. 

He turned wildly to look at Crutchie, then back out the window, calculating the odds that he could escape before the ship got any closer. 

Factoring in the minefield of debris in front of them, the wall of Resistance ships that blocked their path, and the fact that they couldn’t exactly leave the  _ Bowery  _ alone to take the strike, the odds weren’t very high. There was no way out.

Crutchie’s face was pale. “We’re all going to die,” he whispered. 

“This is it,” Mike agreed hollowly. 

Race closed his eyes. It was too bad, really. There was someone he would have liked to see again before the end. So many words he had never spoken. So much time lost. 

So much life never lived, so much love never loved...

The maw of the ship was opened, the cannon was extended, and it  _ fired- _ \- 

__  
  
  



	12. Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pulitzer's cannon fires. Life continues.

_ This is the way the world ends _

_ This is the way the world ends _

_ Not with a bang, but a whimper. _

_ -T.S.Elliot _

* * *

 

 

A sonic wave burst from Pulitzer’s cannon, and all Jack could hear was silence as it ripped its way through the cosmos. 

**_“No!”_ ** he screamed, reaching towards the bars on his window and grabbing at them desperately, as if he could break right through them and somehow stop the blast with just his hand. 

But he couldn’t do  _ anything _ , he was stuck alone in his cell, utterly helpless to do nothing but watch as the beam of death hurtled towards his friends on the  _ Bowery,  _ his family on the  _ Manhattan,  _ Davey, Medda, Crutchie, Race, Les, Albert,  _ all  _ of them and the ghostly quiet was torn to shreds as the sonic blast struck metal--

The shock waves from the beam rumbled the stars, smashing their way through ships and satellites alike as it charged out from the cannon like a herd of angry animals and Jack could  _ see  _ the energy hurtling toward him, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of the  _ Manhattan  _ out there and had no time to prepare himself when the shock waves slammed into the  _ Refuge  _ and knocked it off its axis. Everything was sideways. 

Jack fell back from the window, thrown across his cell as the entire ship tilted to the side… and he just closed his eyes and let go.

He couldn’t form any semblance of thoughts as his back slammed against the bars of his cell, knocking the very breath out of his lungs, and he was pretty sure he heard a definite  _ crack!  _ as he was bent backwards over the rungs. 

His leg dangled out through the gaps in the bars and throughout the hall he could hear the echoing complaints of other prisoners, but from his window he heard only the sound of an explosion and a fireball erupted outside, casting the room in a brilliant bright light. 

There wasn’t much left to Jack, lying there helpless. Unmoving. He breathed in rattling, hollow breaths and he shook as he realized exactly what this whole ordeal had cost him. 

It cost him  _ everything.  _

It was his fault. It was all his fault. He should never have left, he should have stayed with his family, his brothers, it should have been him on that ship,  _ it should have been him-- _

And he couldn’t get Davey’s face out of his mind, with his ridiculous nose and bright smile and curly hair and those eyes that burned a hole right through the core of him. And the way his lips moved to form those words, “I trust you,” or the way his voice kind of quieted over the radio when he made Jack promise that he would come back home, except there was no home for him to go back to, there was no  _ one-- _

With a start, Jack realized he had been muttering to himself, a steady stream of “no, no, no, no,” just under his breath, and his hands were clenched so tightly that all the blood had been drained out of them and they were whiter than the stars, the stars he could see through the window, the window that showed him nothing of the fate of his friends, the window that showed him only the black emptiness that was space. 

He squeezed his eyes shut, picturing the green of Earth, blue of seas, the planet that wasn’t nothing, the planet that was filled with  _ everything,  _ but somehow the place didn’t feel the same, it felt empty now, and sad, so Jack opened his eyes and embraced the void. 

And in the void lay a pair of warm hazel eyes, kind and faithful. Strong. Reliable. Full of determination and with the eyes came a voice. A voice so strong and so familiar that Jack felt a churning low in his gut. 

_ “Get up,”  _ the voice demanded in his mind. Jack steadied himself and obeyed. 

“What do I do?” he asked aloud, his hands trembling where he braced himself. The voice manifested itself into a person, a person he knew so well. The very person he wanted to see most right now.

_ “Easy,”  _ the apparition of Davey shrugged.  _ “You keep living.”  _

Keep living. 

Even though his whole family was gone, Jack was still alive. 

“How?” he whispered. Davey smiled, and sailed forward through the air, placing a hand on his chest and covering his heart. Jack could feel the blood pulsing through his veins start to steady. 

_ “With this,”  _ he replied simply, and began to vanish. 

Jack reached for him. “Davey, wait!” The vision paused, and Jack hesitated, his lungs bursting with a million questions he wanted to ask.  _ Where do I go? How can I escape? What would I do once I’m out?  _

_ Are you really gone?  _

He settled on not a question, but a statement. “I’m sorry.” 

A beat. 

_ “I know.”  _ And with that, he disappeared, taking with him all the weight that had been crushing Jack until now.

“Okay,” he said, carefully scooting across the bars. The  _ Refuge  _ hadn’t yet been tilted back over, which could mean either something had been damaged by the shock waves, or Snyder had abandoned ship. Both were equally as likely, but speculating wasn’t doing Jack any good. 

The bars to the cell weren’t thin enough for him to squeeze through, and there weren’t any keys just lying about… but the plank of wood Jack had been using as a bed was now tilted to the side and frayed a bit in places. He stared at one particularly large chunk of wood that had come loose and smiled grimly. 

Perfect. 

After several minutes, multiple bits of wood, and numerous splinters, Jack finally managed to get the lock to click open. The bars dropped out from under him, and Jack fell across the hall and landed hard on his back. He winced as he pulled himself up. Yep. He was definitely going to be sore after this was over. 

He tried not to think about this being over. 

Slowly, Jack snuck down the hall, carefully stepping around other cell bars. Boys in their rooms blinked up at him from where they lay dazed on their windows. He met the eyes of one and put his finger to his lips. The boy nodded solemnly. 

Eventually, Jack made it all the way to the end of the hall, and jumped to push the release button of the door in front of him. Like jaws of a beast, they slid vertically open, and he pulled himself up and through. 

The corridors were blessedly empty, though Jack erred on the side of caution and went out of his way to keep to the shadows. Once or twice he passed an intersection he had to leap over, and heard the distinct sounds of raised voices, but he managed to avoid enough trouble to make it to the other side of the ship. 

He leaned his back up against the wall below the doors to the  _ Refuge’s  _ Deck, pressing an ear to the cool metal and listening for any indication that people were in there. 

Nothing. He couldn’t make anything out through the metal. Jack hesitantly glanced up at the release button and grimaced. He’d have to take his chances; he knew that the only way to get to the place the escape pods were docked was to pass through the Deck.

He’d been on this ship once or twice before. 

Taking a deep breath, Jack bent down and leaped up for the button. He immediately ducked back down the second his hand slammed against the mechanism, but he didn’t hear any surprised muttering or scrambling for weapons once the doors slid open. 

Jack cautiously stood up and peered into the room, exhaling a sigh of relief. The Deck was empty. 

All of the loose objects had been cast to the side when the ship had tilted, but the  _ Refuge’s  _ Deck had its own separate gyro-stabilizers, so everything else was right-side up. Jack pulled himself up through the door, and twisted sideways as gravity took hold and reoriented him right-side up. It took the Junkie a minute to get his head straight. Reorienting always made him a little dizzy, and the added gravity of the neutron star was not of much help. 

Jack stood up and got his bearings. The  _ Refuge’s  _ Deck looked more modern than he expected from this rattling old prison ship, complete with sleek white flooring and state-of-the-art holoscreens. He whistled quietly. Pulitzer must have tricked the ship out as a bribe for Snyder. 

He waited another moment against the wall in case he missed somebody hiding out in the shadows, but when no one sprung out at him with their gun blazing, he carefully stepped further into the room. The glass windows were all darkened, most likely as a result of a shortage from the shockwave. Good thing, too--Jack was in no mood to see what lay beyond the windows of this ship. 

He made his way across the Deck, taking care to tread silently and dodge the cluttered dashboards, screens and chairs, towards the door on the other side. He was so close, he knew the escape pods lay just past him, and he reached a hand out for the lever triumphantly--

“Jack Kelly.” A voice and a click of a gun made him freeze in place, his arms hovering midway to the lever. “I always knew you were quite a troublemaker. Hands in the air, and why don’t you turn around so I can see your disgusting face.” 

Out of options, Jack did as the man said, turning to meet the fiendish General Snyder.

“That’s awfully rude of you, insulting my face like that,” he snarked, eyes flitting around the room in search of something he could use to get out of this. 

Snyder sneered. “Fortunately, I won’t have to be seeing it for much longer. Pulitzer says you’ve got an order for…  _ transfer.”  _

Jack’s heart skipped nervously. He knew what Snyder meant. Kids who got transfer orders weren’t ever heard from again. 

“Still making money off a’ abusing kids, Snyder?” he tossed out, stalling for time. 

“Now don’t go making fun of my hospitality. Maybe if you keep talking, I’ll treat you to some of it. See what money I’m  _ really  _ making.” 

Jack made a face. “I’ll pass, thanks.” 

“You don’t have a choice,” Snyder replied and jerked the gun. “Let’s go--” He stopped, and a wicked grin slowly crossed his face. 

“What?” Jack asked fearfully. That kind of look on anyone’s face did not mean anything good, especially on a man like Snyder. 

The General extended the gun at Jack and casually shifted towards one of the dashboards. “Awfully dark in here, isn’t it?” 

Jack nervously tracked his movements, but the panels were angled at such a degree that he couldn’t see where Snyder’s hand was reaching. 

“What do you mean?” he asked, attempting to compose himself. He  _ won’t  _ let the man see he was getting to him. He won’t. The General only grinned wider. 

“Maybe I should let a little light in,” he said, and flicked some switch. The sound of mechanisms powering up made Jack’s skin crawl. It finally dawned on him.

“No--” he started, his breaths getting more and more shallow. “Snyder, leave it. No!” 

Slowly the black cover dulling the windows slowly rose, revealing a sight Jack knew he wouldn’t be able to stomach. He squeezed his eyes shut and turned away. “Don’t,” he begged through gritted teeth. 

Snyder began to cackle, a harsh raspy thing that clawed its way through Jack’s ears and into his brain. “What’s the matter, boy?” he jeered. “Lost your bravado, have you?” 

Jack started shaking. He couldn’t look, he didn’t want to, but he felt the light of the star shine on his eyelids and he worried that maybe he wouldn’t have a choice, maybe the very image of the remnants of his ship would worm its way into his head somehow-- _ and he could already see the broken pieces of his family strewn about the stars, could already see the dust clearing to reveal a horrifying absence, could already see the bodies of the only friends he’d ever known lifeless among the cosmos, and Davey’s face, ghostly and pale, penetrated his mind, and Snyder’s laugh just grew louder and louder and louder and-- _

Snyder froze halfway through his laughter. 

“Oh shit, _ ”  _ he muttered blankly, and much to Jack’s surprise, he turned on his heel and sprinted out of the room. 

Jack stared after the retreating back of the General as he bustled his way down the hall and turned a corner, unable to comprehend the sudden shift. Whatever Snyder had seen, it was enough to thoroughly freak him out. 

The Junkie slowly turned his reluctant eyes towards the windows that now revealed the battlespace--

 

* * *

 

A shadow covered the entirety of the  _ Manhattan’s  _ Deck, and Crutchie opened his eyes. 

The darkness was a different shade of black than he was used to, and the ship was eerily silent, like everything had been frozen in time. The shadow blocked the window and beyond that, the stars. The alarm lights had bathed the Deck in a flickering red. Through it, Crutchie could see the vague shapes of the other Junkies, frozen as well. 

“Is this the afterlife?” he muttered to himself, and gently unwrapped his torso from where he clung to the wall. He gave his bad leg an experimental shake, but sighed when he discovered it couldn’t move any better than normal. “I’d hoped I could at least be rid of this thing when I died.” 

“Are we dead?” Albert whispered next to him, nervously breaking the silence. He looked around the Deck. “I thought it’d be… different.” 

“I don’t think so,” Crutchie mused. “I once heard a story that crew mates who died on their ship stayed there forever.” 

Albert groaned. “I’m stuck with you all  _ forever?”  _

“Shut up, we all know you love us,” Race cut in from the controls. He rubbed his head and winced. “I hope we won, at least.” 

Albert snorted. “Did you see the size of that cannon? It probably wiped out whole  _ station,  _ let alone our ship.” 

“Maybe Jack made it out,” Crutchie piped up, and the two other Junkies fell silent for a moment. 

“Hey ‘Bert,” Race said, changing the subject. “Maybe now you’ll be able to pay back all that money you owe me from poker?” 

“You’re crazy,” Albert shot back. “I paid up, we’re even!” 

Race shook his head. “I beat you the other night, remember?  _ I  _ suggested strip poker, but you wanted to play--” 

“Guys?” Crutchie interrupted, moving closer to the window. He squinted. “I don’t think that’s a shadow. That looks like  _ metal.”  _

“Oh great.” Albert threw his hands up sarcastically. “Just my luck. An eternity of metal. I always thought maybe the afterlife would be a nice, lush green jungle.” 

“Wait, quiet,” Crutchie shushed him. “Do you hear that?” 

The boys fell silent (Albert with a roll of his eyes) and listened for whatever Crutchie was hearing. After a minute, Race nodded slowly. 

“I hear it,” he said. Just barely perceptible was the sound of static, and a talking voice. He turned to Albert. “Is our radio still on?” 

The Junkie shrugged. “We’re dead. Why does it matter?” 

Race glared at him. “Just turn the damn thing on.” 

He groaned, but nonetheless he jumped off of the console he was perched on and stomped over to the coms. With a few defiant jabs, he began powering it up. “It’ll take a second,” he explained. 

Crutchie had lost interest. He was limping even closer to the glass, practically pressing his face up against it. With a start, he realized the metal was  _ moving,  _ ever so slowly, and a couple painted letters was starting to come into view. 

“It’s a ship!” he exclaimed excitedly, and Race quickly unbuckled himself.   
“A ship?” he asked, and joined Crutchie at the window. Sure enough, the letters began to fill the entire glass panel, and he caught his breath. “No way…” he whispered, too shocked to speak any louder. “That’s not possible.” 

“The radio’s on!” Albert called, picking up a headset. He fiddled with a few dials and frowned as he listened. Suddenly, the Junkie yanked his head away. “Hey… Race? You’re never gonna believe who’s broadcasting--” 

“It’s the  _ Brooklyn,”  _ Race interrupted. The massive red peeling letters filled their whole view. He nodded slowly and couldn’t hide a small grin that was starting to form. 

“ _ Brooklyn’s  _ here.”

 

* * *

 

“Alright boys, disengage shields and return fire!” Spot commanded at the front of his ship. He set his jaw. “Give ‘em hell.” 

Agents swarmed the control room, and after a few moments, the  _ Brooklyn  _ shook with the power of their artillery as cannons burst from their decks down below and fired. Pure jet beams of energy ripped across the space tenfold and tore Pulitzer’s ship to shreds with a steady wave of firepower. Soon there was absolutely nothing left. 

Spot nodded in satisfaction. “Get me on a radio,” he told someone, and the black box was instantly placed into his hands. He pressed the button. “Ms. Pulitzer.” 

After a moment, static crackled back.  _ “General Conlon!”  _ Katherine exclaimed.  _ “It sure is good to hear your voice. Thank you, on behalf of the entire Resistance.”  _

“It was my pleasure, ma’am trust me. Pulitzer pulled quite a few strings to get me court-martialed,” he explained. “Fortunately, I have some powerful connections in the Senate myself, and I’m here on their orders. Mind updating me on your plan?” 

_ “That’s good to hear! We were ambushed the second we arrived. We would have been destroyed if it wasn’t for you and your crew.”  _

“I’m going to have to lead an investigation into this incident, you know that.” 

_ “Of course,”  _ Katherine agreed.  _ “Maybe I should brief you in person?”  _

“I think time is of the essence,” he replied. “There are more Senate ships on the way. If they see the size of your fleet, they may not take too kindly to you during the investigation--” 

Katherine cut him off.  _ “We’re not going to leave. Pulitzer still has people in the Senate. We’ll stay and make sure he is brought to justice, no matter what the cost.”  _

Spot narrowed his eyes. “Kat,” he said evenly. “They  _ will  _ arrest you, and I don’t have the power to protect all of you--” 

_ “I know General. Some things are worth the risk.”  _

“Yes. Some are…” Spot mused. “Alright. I’m going to parlay with Pulitzer and see if I can get him to stand down. You and your fleet can stay, but don’t fire anymore. We can’t afford a shoot-out.” 

_ “Understood. Radio us with an update.”  _

“I will,” he promised, and shut the radio off. He turned to a soldier, and as he handed it to him, he asked, “Were you able to get in touch with the  _ Manhattan?”  _

The soldier shook his head. “No, sir. We believe that their transmissions may have been damaged by the blast.” 

Spot sighed. “We’ll just have to wait for them, then. I don’t want to risk sending a team down. In the meantime, send out a request for communications with Pulitzer. Emphasize its urgency, I want to wrap this all up before the Senate gets here.” 

The soldier saluted, just as another spun around from her desk. “General!” 

“What is it?” Spot asked, bending over the agent’s shoulder as she pointed on the screen. 

“We’ve got an incoming trans-spatial manned vehicle.” 

He frowned. “A space elevator? Where is it coming from?” 

“The  _ Manhattan,  _ sir. But… who would do something so risky in the middle of a battlespace?” She looked at him in confusion. 

The General set his jaw. “I know who. Let him in.” 

She hesitated, then nodded. “Yes sir.” 

 

* * *

 

Race wasted no time in grabbing Davey and slinging him over his shoulder. He glanced at Specs’, still unconscious on the floor. 

“Sorry man,” he said, starting towards the door to the space elevator. “I can only carry one person.” 

“Race!” Crutchie said, grabbing his arm. “Are you sure this is a good idea? It’s risky to take an elevator _ ,  _ especially right now.” 

“Yeah,” Albert jumped in. “You asking to get blown to bits?” 

“Pulitzer won’t shoot me, not when Sp--the  _ Brooklyn  _ is right there. Besides,” he hefted Davey. “Jack took my  _ Corona.  _ What else am I supposed to use?” 

Crutchie shook his head. “I still don’t think this is the right play.” 

Race gave him a look. “Come on, the  _ Brooklyn  _ is the only ship that can fix Davey, and plus our transmitting satellite’s busted. How else are we supposed to know what’s going on?” 

“But how will you tell  _ us?”  _ Albert muttered. Race ignored him, though, and made his way to the rack on the wall. He grabbed a gun and holstered it, then shot what was supposed to be a reassuring look back toward the Junkies. 

“I’ll be back,” he promised, jabbing a thumb on the elevator button and stepping inside.

Albert and Crutchie looked uncertain, but there was nothing they could do as the doors closed on Race’s determined expression. 

“You think he’ll be okay?” Crutchie asked. 

After a pause, Albert nodded. “He can take care of himself.  _ We,  _ on the other hand…” he took a look around the junk-strewn Deck, and off in the distance he could hear the clattering of the gunners making their way down the hall. “We have quite a mess to clean up.” 

 

* * *

 

Katherine slowly set the radio back down on its cradle, her face contorted in thought. 

“Ma’am?” an agent prompted her. “Should we circle Pulitzer?” The room held its breath in anticipation of her answer as she absent-mindedly tapped on the console. 

“He still has a lot of pull in the Senate,” she mused. “An investigation would only set him back. And now that he has the neon…” 

They waited as she trailed off. After a beat, she blinked twice and smiled easily. 

“Pull back our troops, as we said,” she commanded. Several agents nodded and ran off to their stations, and the rest went back to work. No one noticed as she pulled the one agent closer and lowered her voice. “The investigation will lead to nowhere,” she told the woman. “My father will just weasel his way out of it, like he does everything. We need to finish what we came here for.” 

“Does that mean…?” the agent said, too nervous to complete her sentence. She didn’t have to. Katherine nodded. 

“Send a stealth squadron around back and fire on World Headquarters. Leave nothing left.” 

The agent caught her breath, but quickly saluted. 

“Yes ma’am.” 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oof, I'll be honest I had to rewrite this chapter a couple of times. There's just so many directions I want it to go! Thanks for your patience everyone, and still for all the support!


	13. Tempt My Trouble

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sprace!!

_The way we used to feel_

_You're my heart-breaker_

_I'm your heart-taker_

_Unchain my load_

_But don't you ever let me go_

* * *

 

Spot stood at the doors to the elevator docking bay, gripping his hands behind his back in anticipation. 

He knew who was going to be standing behind those doors when they opened, he knew the voice that was going to greet him, he knew what color those eyes would be-- a piercing blue, as icy as the frozen moons of the Cayuga belt--and for the life of him he had no idea what to do. 

He’d had a lot of time think about it, too. During his trial, he was kept in one of Pulitzer’s prisons, and there wasn’t much to do in there but speculate.  He turned words over in his head, constructed arguments and explanations, built sentences from the dust on the floor, and imagined the blue of those eyes over and over again. Space, in its infinite, always managed to dull the brightest of colors--but it couldn’t touch the brilliance of this one. 

A gut-wrenching moment of stillness as the robotic mechanisms locked the vehicle in place, and then a hiss of the hydraulics as the doors opened and Spot could do nothing but stare as he found himself once again meeting the gaze of someone he hadn’t seen for what felt like a lifetime.

The Junkie slowly stepped out of the elevator, another boy slung around his shoulders and his eyes met Spot’s. 

The General immediately nodded to the guard next to him, and she rushed forward and carefully took the unconscious Junkie. She hefted him over her shoulder and started down the hall towards the Med bay, leaving Spot and the boy alone in the hallway. 

He couldn’t help but catch his breath: the left side of the Junkie’s face was covered by a nasty gash, and his clothes were torn in several places. There were deep bags under his eyes, and his skin was so pale he looked like a ghost. But no matter how he roughed-up he looked, Spot couldn’t help but feel a flip in his heart. 

“Race,” he breathed, and suddenly the Junkie was starting towards him, moving faster and faster and Spot found himself running to meet him as he stretched out an arm and pulled him close. 

Race surged up against him, pressing his mouth to Spot’s. His hands fell naturally to the General’s hips as Spot’s arms circled around him and held him tightly. He could feel the wet blood on his cheek, but he didn’t care about that, all he cared about was that Race was  _ here,  _ in his embrace, and it was his hands that were cupping his face and it was his fingers trailing down his collarbone and Spot really didn’t plan on going anywhere anytime soon--

Race pressed two hands to his chest and pushed the General away. 

“I’m still mad at you,” he said stubbornly, his voice cracking as he wiped his lips and tried to force a frown despite his bright flushing cheeks. 

Spot sighed and reached out to take his hand. Race didn’t lean into it, but he didn’t pull away either. “I know,” he replied. “I think it’s time we talked about what happened.” 

“What’s there to talk about?” the Junkie responded, his fingers twitching against Spot’s palm. “You kicked me out. End of story.” 

Spot fixed him with a stare. “Race,” he said evenly. “You really think I  _ wanted  _ to?” 

“How am I supposed to know?” he replied stubbornly, glaring at the floor. 

“Hey,” Spot sharply said, reaching out to make Race look at him. “I didn’t have a choice. Things… things were complicated. Race, we were in a relationship, and that wasn’t allowed between officers. The higher-ups, _Pulitzer,_ they made me demote you.” 

“You could have said no.” Race refused to look at him. “You had a choice.” 

Spot gripped his hand tightly. “ _ No,  _ Race, I didn’t. It was either you get demoted, or--” He broke off before he could finish his sentence, but the Junkie picked up on his hesitation. 

“Or what?” he demanded, narrowing his eyes. “What would have happened?  _ You  _ would have gotten demoted instead?” Spot shifted, opening his mouth to answer, but Race kept talking, his voice rising higher in volume with each word. “No. That’s it, isn’t it? You would have lost your job, so you threw me under the bus instead!” 

“Race, I--” The Junkie yanked his hand away. Spot took a deep breath. “Race, that was before the Resistance’s attack on Hearst station. My job was to gather intelligence, which I couldn’t do if I had been demoted! You have to understand--” Race was shaking his head and pulling away. Desperate, Spot pushed on. “ _ You have to understand,  _ I was fighting to bring down Pulitzer! I knew that if I stayed where I was, I could eventually help bring him down. But if I didn’t, if I stepped down instead, we would never have been able to be together!” 

“We  _ both _ could have left,” Race muttered. 

Spot clenched his hands behind his back in an attempt to regain his composure. “I--” 

“You didn’t even think of that, did you? If--if you just  _ told  _ me, maybe we could have worked something out together, but y-you just  _ don’t  _ tell me anything!” Race was gaining momentum again, stomping toward him and towering over Spot. “You always think you can do everything by yourself, but you  _ can’t.  _ You just push others away, and then whine about it when nothing works out!” 

Spot pursed his lips, hurt. “Race, I’m sorry.” 

“Don’t--” 

Spot gritted his teeth, grabbed the Junkie’s collar and yanked him down to his level as he scowled. Their faces hovered inches apart. “Listen up,” he commanded, and out of sheer force of habit, Race straightened at his tone. “I’m. Sorry. You have to believe that I never meant to hurt you. And you’re right, I should have talked to you. I-I fucked up big time, Race, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to make it up to you. I sure as hell won’t ever be able to forgive myself.” 

He took a breath and stared Race directly in his eyes. That blue… he didn’t think he’d ever get see it again, but here they were, and he wanted nothing more than to make them soften. “I thought I was doing the right thing, choosing defeating Pulitzer over us. But I was rash, and I destroyed  _ this _ in the process. I’m so sorry.” 

He caught his breath and relaxed his clenched chest. There. He had said it all. General Conlon was never one to back down, not even when staring down the muzzle of a sonic cannon, but this-- _ this  _ right here? It made him long for a deadly firefight. 

He didn’t waver, not as Race searched his eyes for a sign of truth. He didn’t waver even as he caught a glimpse of the Junkie’s deepening frown, he just balanced on the pinpoint of a needle and waited. 

A beat. Then another. And another, and still Race had made no indication of a reply. Spot’s heart sank, he wasn’t able to make the Junkie understand after all, and slowly released his grip on Race’s collar--

Race’s hand shot out and cupped the back of Spot’s neck, dragging him up, and pressed his lips to the General’s. 

Spot’s eyes widened in surprise as he took a step closer to keep his balance, his hands lifting up to rest on the Junkie’s hips. “Race…” he murmured as they broke apart for a breath. 

“Shut up,” Race commanded, roughly kissing him again, and for once Spot listened. He sank into the embrace and sighed, Race’s fingertips burning the skin where they touched his face, and the kiss didn’t feel hungry or desperate or forced or anything unnatural-- 

It felt, quite simply, like coming home. 

* * *

Davey woke up staring into a pair of vaguely familiar eyes. 

“Oh good, you’re up,” a chipper voice sounded, grating against his ears. “Davey? Can you hear me?” 

He groaned and sat up, dimly registering the fact that he passed out onto a hard metal floor in the middle of a warzone, and woke up on a fluffy mattress that felt like a nebula. “Where am I?” he mumbled, rubbing his arm which was suddenly sore. 

“You’re on the  _ Brooklyn,”  _ the voice answered, and Davey traced it to a woman in a doctor’s coat. She bustled around the room, opening and closing cabinets and generally just making a racket that only caused his head to hurt more. 

“Did we win? Is everyone okay?” he asked her, straightening. “Where’s Jack? Is he here? Did you find him?” 

The doctor laughed, a small tinkling sound (he placed her now, she was the one who had helped him while they were stuck in the Harlem Belt). “My, you sure ask a lot of questions!” 

“I’d like to get a few answers,” he replied, wincing at how harsh it sounded. He didn’t want to be rude, but the last thing he knew he and the Junkies were fighting for their lives, and this doctor was now leisurely scrolling on her holoscreen. 

“Hold your horses,” she chided. “You just woke up from a nasty collapse!” 

“Well I’m feeling fine now,” Davey said, swinging his legs over the side of his bed. “Is there--?” He stopped as her words finally hit him. “Did you say the  _ Brooklyn?”  _

The doctor sighed. “I try not to overwhelm my patients when they first wake up, but goodness you are persistent. Yes, you’re on the  _ Brooklyn.  _ Your crew, I assume, is mostly safe. General Conlon is talking to one of the members now--you lay back down! I will let him know you’re awake!” 

“But that’s impossible,” Davey protested as the woman pushed him back onto the bed. “I thought the  _ Brooklyn  _ was taken by Pulitzer?” 

The doctor hmphed. “General Conlon is very talented at getting his way. I don’t think anything in his life has turned out different than he wanted!” 

“Okay…” Davey reluctantly let his head fall back on his pillow, and the doctor hurried over to the com station. 

“General Conlon, the Junker is awake now!” 

_ “Good,”  _ came the reply.  _ “Send him over to the Deck. Negotiations will start in three minutes.”  _

The doctor sighed again. “Honestly. You’re supposed to get better by  _ resting.”  _

Davey shot up from his bed and grabbed his jacket that was hanging on a nearby chair, eager to go. “Great, so the Deck is that way?” 

She rolled her eyes and gestured in exasperation. “Yes, yes, down the hall and take two lefts and a right. I suppose it won’t do any good for me to tell you to take it slow, will it?” 

Davey stopped, feeling guilty. He turned back toward her. “Thank you for helping me, twice now. Can I pay you, or--” 

She waved him off. “Nonsense, I’m just doing my job. And the military pays resident doctors very handsomely.” She winked. “Just send my regards to the General. And I’m serious! Don’t go doing anything especially dangerous!”    


* * *

 

Davey skidded onto the Deck, throwing his coat on and pulling down the collar. Race and Spot stood at the front engaged in a quiet discussion. He couldn’t help but notice the way Race was leaning in especially close, or the way Spot’s hand hovered slightly in the air between them. 

“Sorry I’m late,” he panted as he ran up to them. The two turned to greet him, Race with a look of mild surprise. 

“That was fast,” he commented. “You sure you aren’t going to pass out on us again?” 

Spot spoke up as Davey nodded. “Doctor Smith is the best of the best. It’s surprising it took you this long.” 

He rubbed the back of his neck. “I was up a while ago, but I got lost on the way here.” Race snorted. “Hey, it’s a big ship!” 

“You got lost almost everyday your first week,” Spot reminded Race, and his smile fell. 

“Yeah, well…” he muttered. 

Davey looked between the two of them. “Mind filling me in?” he said, feeling as if he was interrupting a moment. 

Spot turned and nodded curtly. “Your friends are safe on the  _ Manhattan.  _ I’m here on behalf of the Solar Senate to begin an investigation into the World’s practices. Negotiations will start in a few minutes.” 

Davey absorbed this news. “Did you find Jack yet?” he asked, and Spot and Race exchanged glances. 

“We know he’s here,” Race started slowly. “The  _ Corona’s  _ tracker showed it in the vicinity. But we’re… not sure where he is. He could be anywhere on the base.” 

Davey blinked, shoving aside the observation that Race spoke more formally than normal next to Spot. “So where have you guys looked so far?” 

Race narrowed his eyes, but Spot cut in before he could say anything. “We haven’t been looking for him.” 

“What?” Davey asked, his face drawn up in confusion. “Why not? You have all the resources--Race, come on. He’s your captain!” 

“Hey man,” Race snapped, all trace of formality gone. “We were a little busy fighting a  _ war  _ while you were napping. We haven’t exactly had a lot of free time.” 

Davey recoiled, flushing a little. “That’s not--I didn’t mean it that way. I’m sorry.” 

Spot placed a hand on Race’s shoulder. “Once we make a deal with Pulitzer, we’ll be able to look for Jack. We’ll find him, David.” Davey nodded at him gratefully and Spot checked the clock on the wall. “Speaking of which, we should be getting a call soon. You two may stay on camera with me, but please let me do all the talking.” 

Race and Davey agreed, and soon the holoscreen was up displaying an image of Pulitzer in what looked to be his office, grand and luxurious. 

_ “General Conlon,”  _ he said. Davey had met Pulitzer once before after he picked he and Les up from the  _ Singer  _ on which they lived, but still his sharp cheekbones and twisted goatee sent chills down his spine. Coupled with shadows that covered his face, Pulitzer looked downright evil. 

“Mr. Pulitzer,” Spot acknowledged. “I’m here to make a deal with you.” 

_ “Are you? Interesting. And what are you offering?”  _

“Your life,” the General replied simply. “I’m here on behalf of the Solar Senate, and I’ve been commanded to apprehend you by any means necessary for an investigation. If you cooperate, this whole thing will go that much easier.” 

_ “And if I don’t?”  _ Pulitzer asked, frowning.  _ “I have plenty of forces left to fend off any attack.”  _

“Actually,” Spot countered. “You don’t. We just took out your biggest guns within a half a parsec, and with the Resistance fleet on our side, you’re outnumbered. Have a look out your window, Mr. Pulitzer. In case you haven’t figured it out yet, we got you surrounded.” 

Race bit his lip to suppress a smile. Damn _ ,  _ he had forgotten how  _ good _ Spot was at his job. 

_ “Very well. I will consent to a search, but only once the Senate arrives. In the meantime, General, please remove your troops from my headquarters.”  _

The General nodded. “You won’t have to wait long. We will discuss this further later--” 

“Wait,” Davey interrupted. Spot turned to glare at him, but he kept talking. “What about the neon?” 

_ “Neon?”  _ Pulitzer trained his cold eyes on Davey.  _ “I have no idea what you are talking about, boy.”  _

“The neon,” Davey repeated, and he saw Race’s eyes widen in recognition. “Jack brought it to bargain with. If he’s not here, then  _ you  _ must have taken it and double crossed him.” 

_ “I assure you, I don’t--”  _

“Is it true?” Spot interjected. “You know that if you lie now, and the investigators find it later that you will face severe consequences for withholding evidence.” 

On the screen, Pulitzer drew himself up to his full height.  _ “I don’t have anything of the sort, and frankly I’m getting tired of this interrogation. Any further questions, and I will demand to have an attorney present.”  _

A pause as Spot searched him suspiciously, then nodded. “Very well. We will wait for you as you have one brought here.” 

Pulitzer turned a bright shade of red.  _ “I swear, General, that once this so called investigation is over, you will never be in a position of command again.”  _

“Well sir,” Spot replied, glancing at Race out of the corner of his eye. “That’s just a risk I am willing to take.” 

He waved his hand and the connection was cut off. 

* * *

 

“Uno.” 

Albert gritted his teeth in frustration as Les smiled triumphantly. The boy held only a single card in his hands, while the Junkie carried at least ten. 

To his left, Romeo cackled. “Alright Les!” 

“You’re playing too,” Elmer reminded him, and Romeo shrugged. 

“I planned for him to win. All of my moves was strategic like that,” he replied, and placed a red reverse card down. Les grinned widely and threw down his last card, high-fiving Romeo. “Like that, see?” 

Albert groaned. “Remind me never to play Uno with any of you’se again. Les  _ always  _ wins, Romeo just plays to make me lose, and Finch--” They all looked over to the Junkie who had moved away from the circle and was busy attempting to throw cards while Henry tried to catch them in his mouth. “Finch is just being himself.” 

“Davey and I would always play it back at home,” Les explained as he expertly shuffled the deck. “He normally won but I picked up a few tricks.” 

Albert threw up his hands. “Of course ya did. I’m just glad Race isn’t here right now. He’d be throwing a fit.” 

There was a beat as the weight of their words settled on their shoulders. Without the presence of Jack, Davey  _ and  _ Race, the  _ Manhattan  _ felt unnaturally empty. Albert couldn’t help but glance at the figure of the  _ Brooklyn  _ out the window. 

“Can you do a backhand shuffle?” Elmer asked Les, breaking the momentary silence. The boy shook his head, and Elmer gestured to him. “Here, I’ll show you.” He proceeded to stack the cards up, and flip them one by one over the back of his palm. 

Les’ mouth fell open. “How do you do that?” 

“Wanna learn?” he asked, grinning as the boy nodded eagerly. “It takes a bit to learn, but once you get it, it’s real easy…” 

Albert pushed himself up as Elmer explained the trick to Les and walked over to join Crutchie where he stood by the dashboard. “Any updates?” 

Crutchie shook his head, not breaking his eyes away from the screen. “Nothing yet.” 

Albert sighed, folding his arms and leaning against the wall. “Y’know you don’t have to be watching that 24/7. We’ll probably know if Race and Davey are coming back.” 

“When.” 

“Huh?” 

“ _ When  _ they come back. Not if.” 

Albert scratched his neck. “Oh. Yeah. When.” He sighed when Crutchie didn’t react any further. “Come on Crutch, we just survived an entire battle without any major injuries. Rest a little, relax! Look, even Specs is partying!” 

They glanced over at the Junkie in the corner, his wound freshly bandaged, sitting at a table with Jojo and Buttons. His eyes were narrowed in concentration, and he rubbed his chin thoughtfully. The two other Junkies stared at the table intently as he slowly reached his hand out and moved a small object. 

“Connect four,” he said, and Jojo and Buttons groaned, throwing their arm up in frustration. 

“You’re right,” Crutchie agreed, back at the monitor. “Man, that’s so unlike him.” 

Albert nodded eagerly. “Come on. It won’t hurt nothing if you took a nap or something, like Mush. Or you could get in on our game of cards.” 

The Junkie bit his lip hesitantly. “Okay, I’ll play. Only one round, though.” 

Albert nodded, a grin breaking across his face. “One round. Let’s go!” 

The two of them made their way over to Finch, Elmer and Les, and they were immediately dealt in. “Prepare to go down, Les,” Albert shot, and even Crutchie smiled as the boy stuck his tongue out in response. 

And there the Junkies waited, floating in the pieces of a newly wrought battlefield as they played in their own little personal haven. Outside, a silver stealth ship slipped through the remnants of broken ships, an old prison ship creaked and groaned as a hatch slid open and a small pod shot through, and in the center of it all sat the spider, weaving his web of deception. But the crew of the  _ Manhattan  _ had no knowledge of any of these happenings, and they wouldn’t until it was too late. 

Like pawns on a chessboard, they laughed obliviously on. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow still all of your comments are amazing! You guys are great!!


	14. Dissipate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've updated the tags... *laughs nervously*  
> Sorry for the delay, I ran out of time to edit yesterday

_ Breathe in, _

_ Exhale.  _

_ A flood of blood to the heart and the fear slipstreams _

_ Tide out, tide in _

* * *

__

_ “Ladies and gentlemen, this is your Captain speaking.”  _

The boy in cell block 32A caught the ball he had been throwing in the air and sat up as the announcement echoed through the empty halls of the  _ Refuge.  _

_ “You may have noticed that this ship is currently flat on its side.”  _

Around him, shouts piped up from the other cells. This was not the ominous monotone voice they were used to over the loudspeakers, this was someone new. And the way he spoke...it was obvious he was not a guard. 

_ “I am currently in the process of fixing that, so if you would all please find something bolted down and grip it tightly…”  _

The boy immediately stuffed the ball into his uniform and bent down, grabbing the bars on his window. 

“Hey!” someone in the cell next to him called. “Sneaky Eyes! What’s going on?” 

He shook his head, though he knew the other person couldn’t see him. “I dunno Sling, but whatever’s happening, you should probably do as the ‘nouncement says.” 

“Aw, I ain’t listenin to no four-flusher on the speakers. It’s prob’ly just a trick anyhow.” 

“Suit ya self, pinhead,” Sneaky Eyes replied, and readjusted his grip on the bars. 

An eerie creaked accompanied a series of  _ clangs  _ as the ship’s old stabilizers finally kicked in and the ship began to tilt. The boy braced himself as the window, which he had previously been laying on, slowly tipped him off his feet. This reorientation was much more gradual than the first one, but still he could hear crashes in the distance as objects slid back to their places. Sling cursed, and seconds later a muffled  _ thump  _ came from the next cell over. Within minutes, Sneaky Eyes was hanging onto the bars and dangling a foot or so off the ground. 

The boy let go and dropped down. 

“Sonuva...” Sling groaned, presumably from the floor. Sneaky Eyes laughed. 

“Told ya so.” 

“Shut up, ya schmuck.” 

“Back at ya, pantywaist.” 

Interrupting their banter, the speakers came on again.  _ “I’m going to be opening your cell blocks in a minute.”  _

Mutters rose throughout the corridor, and one by one the doors to their cells slid open. Sneaky Eyes was the first person to step out and into the hallway, stretching his arms high above his head and exhaling in satisfaction. It had been a long time since he could take more than three steps without running into a wall. 

_ “Guards will be trying to get through to the Deck.”  _

Right on cue, the door to their cell block clanged open and several guards charged in. They skidded to a stop as they saw the boys, angry and ready to fight, stepping out of their cells. 

_ “Would you guys do me a favor and slow them down?”  _

Sneaky Eyes saw the lead guard with a scar across his eye, the one who had always been so eager to give them a thrashing. He grinned evilly and cracked his knuckles. 

“With pleasure.”

 

* * *

 

Jack leaned back and sighed, running his fingers over the armrests. The  _ Refuge’s  _ captain chair was surprisingly soft and plush. He wouldn’t quite mind if it were on his own ship. 

He could hear the sounds of a scuffle outside the Deck, but he wasn’t particularly worried. The prisoners outnumbered the staff on this ship ten to one, and Snyder had probably already taken an escape pod and ran to Pulitzer. 

He longingly looked out the window at the triangle of battleships, the  _ Manhattan,  _ the  _ Bowery,  _ and the  _ Brooklyn.  _ He wanted nothing more than to be on them again, to see his crew, to see Medda and the General and Davey--

But Jack had his own mission right now. He needed to go after Pulitzer. 

He had been a captain long enough to know what steering controls looked like, and after a few moments of search, he found them on the dashboard in front of him. The  _ Refuge  _ was much more high-tech than the old junker ship he was used to piloting, and it took him a minute to figure out the interface. Once he realized it was all holographic, it wasn’t long before the engines of the ship started up, a low rumbling and rattling sound. 

As it powered on, maps appeared all around him, charting stars and the location of other ships and of the prisoners, who all had a tracking chip in their uniform. Right now, there was a large convergence right outside cell block 32A. Jack smiled. The boys were doing their jobs. 

It wasn’t easy to pilot an entire ship by himself; there was so much that goes into making a hunk of metal move--he needed navigators, pressure monitors, gravity stabilizers, someone to control the gyrostabilizers and a lot more. But Jack didn’t get to be Captain of the best junking crew in the universe for nothing. 

He deftly bounced around the Deck, hands flying from switches to levers to screens and the controls, and soon the  _ Refuge  _ groaned and began to move out of the shadows in which it had been hiding. 

“Okay Pulitzer,” Jack said, wiping off a bead of sweat, but full of adrenaline and raring to go. “I’m coming for you now.”

 

* * *

 

Davey strapped on a Kevlar vest and grabbed a gun from a rack.

“No way,” Race argued as the Junkie popped out a magazine, checked it, then slammed it back in. 

“I’m going after Jack,” Davey responded firmly, glaring at the Junkie. “Who knows what Pulitzer’s done to him by now?” 

Race stepped in front of him, blocking the path to the loading bay. “This is a  _ bad idea.  _ You’re not going out there alone.” 

“You can’t stop me,” Davey argued, pushing past him. “Besides, if I don’t do it, who else will?” 

Race opened his mouth to protest, looking back and forth between him and Spot in disbelief. “That’s not--we’ll go  _ after--  _ Spot, you tell him!” 

The General sized Davey up with pursed lips. “Race,” he said. “This isn’t the first time David has been out in the field. He can take care of himself. And…” he lowered his voice. “If it were you, I’d be doing the same thing.” 

Race scowled, his cheeks slightly pink. “I still don’t like it,” he said stubbornly. 

“Yeah, well,” Davey cut in. “It’s not up to you.” 

Spot placed a hand on Race’s shoulder, then turned to the determined Junkie. “You can take one of our ships in the loading bay. Just be sure to stay quiet, and  _ away  _ from Pulitzer. We don’t want this messing up our investigation.” 

Davey nodded firmly, his jaw set and his eyes flickered to Race. 

The Junkie crossed his arms and frowned. “Just come back alive. Jack’ll kill me if you died while he was gone.” 

Davey cracked a small smile. “I’ll do my best,” he promised. And with that, he turned and ran down the hallway. 

Race stared at his retreating back grimly. “It’s dangerous,” he said to Spot. 

“It’s always going to be dangerous,” the General replied. “And if there’s one thing I learned from all of this, it’s that sometimes a little danger is worth it.” 

Race glanced over at him. “Yeah?” 

Spot smiled and elbowed him. “Yeah. Now come on. We’ve got our own matters to tend to.” 

Davey gripped his hands tight against the levers of his ship until his knuckles turned white. The emptied battlespace was unnaturally eerie as fractured remains of ships blown to pieces flipped lazily about as they were dragged toward the neutron star, and the metal spires of World Headquarters creaked and groaned, slowly spinning in a hypnotizing movement while he piloted his way through them. 

The place felt more of a graveyard than anything, the ruins of a structure left behind by an ancient civilization long lost. Shadows were cast beneath each ridge as if they hid from the bright white light he was flying toward, and the mix of these and the fragments seemed to form odd shapes out of the corner of his eye. He could have sworn he saw a large ship lurking somewhere in the dark, but when he turned to get a better look, he saw nothing there. 

_ “Stay away from Pulitzer,”  _ General Conlon had warned him, and Davey guiltily bit his lip. He had no choice but to go to Pulitzer, since he would be the one person that knew where Jack was, and would be the easiest place to start. 

He had studied the schematics with Katherine before the battle, and knew that there was a private docking bay close by Pulitzer’s office. His eyes skimmed the surface of a ring, searching for the small outcropping.  If Davey could only find it… 

There. A small hatch, right on the side. He quickly pulled the yoke and guided his ship down towards it. The motion sensors made the doors slid open as he drew near, revealing an empty and small bay. He gently set himself down inside it and immediately jumped out of his ship. 

World Headquarters wasn’t particularly tricky to navigate--the real problem was avoiding all the personnel that roamed around the halls. Several times, Davey had to backtrack all the way down a corridor just to avoid bumping into somebody. With his Kevlar vest and gun, he knew that one glance and he’d be made. He had no choice to stick to the shadows. 

But finally, he made it to the large oak double doors that lead to Pulitzer’s office. They were intricately designed and, Davey had to admit, certainly impressive. Wood was a luxury few could afford these days, and their dark-colored splendor was something Davey had never seen before. He had to hand it to Pulitzer for that, the guy had good taste. 

But those weren’t the doors he had to enter in through, not if stealth was his objective. No, Davey would have to find another way. If he recalled correctly, there was a system of ventilation that ran through the floors of the Headquarters, and one exit could deposit him in the corner of Pulitzer’s office. 

He bent down and carefully twisted open the grate on the wall. It was going to be a tight fit, but fortunately Davey was rather skinny. He could make it. 

It was a short crawl, and a fairly straightforward one too. He only had to stop a few times to readjust his holster, which was causing his gun to knock against the aluminum lining, and soon Davey was peering through the slits of another vent and into Pulitzer’s office. 

He could barely make out the figure of the man, tall and imposing. He was talking with someone Davey couldn’t see, but from the sound of his terse tone, Pulitzer was not happy. 

_ “I told you, I don’t have it with me.”  _ Davey heard through the grate. He began quietly unscrewing it from the inside painstakingly slowly so he wouldn’t make a sound. 

_ “Then where is it?!”  _ the second person demanded, his voice strangely familiar.  _ “I know it’s still here!”  _

_ “You watch your tone, boy! You shouldn’t go sticking your head into matters that don’t concern you.”  _

With a small click, Davey undid the last screw and carefully popped the grated metal out of its frame. He pushed it to the side and wiggled his way out of the aluminum vent, reaching for his gun behind his back. Luckily, Pulitzer’s massive bookshelf blocked him from view. 

_ “ _ Matters that don’t concern me, huh? Mr. Pulitzer, I’m thinking we both know that’s a lie.”

Davey peeked around the side of the oak shelving, and from there he got a better view of the room. 

Pulitzer was backed up against his desk, his arms slightly raised. The other person, his face still hidden from sight, had a gun out and leveled at him. 

“Really? You, an escaped criminal, think you can beat me at my own game? May I remind you that mere hours ago you were begging me to be merciful?” 

“And here you are now, at  _ my _ mercy.” 

Davey’s eyes widened. He  _ did _ knew that voice, he’d heard it so many times before. It was the voice he could only hear in his imagination for what seemed like weeks, it was the voice he’d been wishing to be closer to, it was the voice he had missed for so long. 

He stepped out from behind the bookshelf and stared at the boy who was holding Pulitzer at gunpoint. 

_ “Jack?”  _

The Captain glanced over at him and lowered the gun slightly as all the blood drained out of his face, like he’d seen a ghost. “Davey?” he said in disbelief. He stuttered, at a loss for words. “What-- _ how _ ?” 

“What are you doing here?” Davey asked at the same time. 

“I… was going to ask  _ you _ that,” Jack answered helplessly, still white as a sheet.

Davey scoffed. “I was looking for  _ you.  _ Where have you been?” 

“You were?” Jack’s voice softened, and a pressure in his chest bubbled. “I was trying to get the neon back.” 

The Junkie glanced between him and Pulitzer. “Does he have it?” 

“No. Well, he says he doesn’t--” The pressure was growing stronger, and soon it was too much for him to bear. “Davey, I’m so sorry,” he burst out.The boy stopped.. “It was stupid of me to leave, and when I saw that cannon fire I thought you had  _ died  _ and I still hadn’t said goodbye and I--I just about  _ lost  _ it--” 

“It’s okay,” Davey interrupted, blinking in surprise. He let himself smile a little. “You don’t have to apologize Jack, I know why you did it.” As he said the words out loud, he knew that he truly meant them. A slight weight lifted off his shoulders.  

Jack relaxed slightly, exhaling a quiet sigh of relief. “Davey…” 

“Well isn’t this a touching reunion?” Pulitzer cut in with a dramatic roll of his eyes. “Should I leave you two alone?” 

The two turned to face him, glaring. “Shut up,” Jack told him with a wave of his gun. “Just tell us where the neon is already.” 

“Or what?” Pulitzer asked, apathetically tugging at his cufflinks. “You’ll shoot me?” 

“You bet I will--” 

“Really?” A beat of hesitation as the man cocked an eyebrow. Jack faltered and glanced at Davey as Pulitzer spoke. “You really think you have the guts to pull that trigger? To  _ kill  _ me?” 

“I…” The Junkie had no response. 

“Jack,” Davey whispered, leaning in close to him. “He’s not gonna give us the neon. The Senate’s on their way, they’ll find it--” 

“That’s right,” Pulitzer jeered. “Run away boys, and let the grown ups handle this.” 

Davey glared at him and tugged at Jack’s sleeve. “Come on, you don’t want to shoot him now, not when the officials are on their way--” 

“I don’t?” Jack gritted, clenching his hand around the gun. He stared at Pulitzer’s nauseating smirk, his haughty eyes, confident that he’s already won and all Jack wanted to do was wipe that look off his face. 

Davey pushed his shoulder, forcing the captain to look at him. “No,” he said firmly. “Killing him is not the answer. Besides, he’s not worth our time.” 

Jack wavered for a moment, but as he met Davey’s eyes, he relaxed. Pulitzer’s jaw twitched. “You’re right,” he said, lowering the gun. He nodded once as if trying to convince himself. “Okay, let’s go.” 

Davey sighed in relief and put a hand on his shoulder. “I’ve got a ship in the bay--” he said as they started out the door. 

“Me too,” Jack added. “And I’ve got a bigger one.” 

“How--?” 

“Long story.” 

“Oh, by the way,” Pulitzer called out from where he still leaned against his desk. He casually twirled a pen between his fingers, but somehow in his hands, it seemed menacing. “Would you mind letting my daughter know I’ve picked up one of her ships?” 

Jack paused and turned around. Davey winced. “What do you mean?” the captain said slowly. 

“Well,” the pen spun and spun faster, “Apparently she sent a ship out to bomb my Headquarters. Obviously, I couldn’t just let that happen.” 

“How would you even know--?” Davey asked. 

“There’s a leak in the Resistance,” Jack said grimly, realization dawning on his face. “That’s how you knew to set up the ambush, too.” 

“A leak?” Davey shook his head. “How did we not notice?” 

“Don’t feel too bad about it,” Pulitzer mused as the pen twisted in between his fingers. “You  _ are  _ just children, after all.” 

Jack growled and started toward him, but Davey grabbed his arm. “Jack, no, come on--” 

“Listen to your master,” Pulitzer sneered, and within an instant, the captain had his gun out and pointed right at the man’s face. 

“ _ Jack!” _

“I’ve had it up to  _ here  _ with you,” Jack gritted. “I’m  _ done _ . Where is the neon?!” 

Pulitzer smiled triumphantly. “Come on, Kelly…” he egged. “Shoot me. You know you want to.” 

“Don’t listen to him,” Davey pleaded, pulling at Jack’s arm. “He’s trying to get you arrested.” 

“What would he have to gain from that?” the Captain shot back. “Look at him. He’s got  _ some  _ game going on, and I’m not leaving until I figure it out.” 

Pulitzer set his jaw in satisfaction. 

 

* * *

 

“Ma’am!” Katherine turned as the agent she had talked to earlier ran up to her. 

“Oh,” she said casually, pushing aside the tablet she was holding. “Sarah, was it?” 

“Yes, ma’am” the agent replied hurriedly. “There’s something wrong…” 

Katherine clenched her teeth as Sarah told her the news: they had lost contact with their stealth bomber. 

“Pulitzer,” she cursed. “He must have found out.” 

“Should we send another?” 

Katherine bit her lip as she considered. “Maria!” she stopped another agent. “When is the Senate supposed to get here?” 

“Twenty minutes, ma’am,” the agent replied before she continued to her station. Katherine closed her eyes and took a deep breath. 

_ What to do…  _ she thought. There was no time to ready another bomb, or to send out another pilot, and although she was willing to risk casualties, there was no point in sending out soldier after soldier to their deaths. Their options were limited, especially with the shadow of the  _ Brooklyn  _ cast over their every move. 

But maybe there was one thing they could do...

Katherine began walking out of the control room. Sarah followed her close behind, half-jogging to keep up. “Ma’am?” 

“The  _ Brooklyn  _ and  _ Manhattan  _ should be far enough out of the way…” she mused to herself. “Given that the radius is a little over a half a mile…” 

“Miss Pulitzer?” Sarah asked, slightly breathless. 

“Call me Katherine,” the Resistance leader corrected. “I’m headed down to the loading bay. Sarah, send out a transmission to our forces and tell them to leave. Let General Conlon know that we’ve changed our minds, and are going to leave before the investigation.” 

“Are you sure?” Sarah asked. “Our troops won’t like it--” 

“Tell them whatever you have to, but make them listen,” Katherine interrupted. “This is important.” 

“Okay…” the agent replied uneasily. “But what are you going to do?” 

“Our only option now is the neutron star,” Katherine explained as they hurried down the corridors. “We won’t be able to get a bomb large enough to blow the whole station, but if we destabilize the star with one of our antiparticle engines, we might just be able to get it to implode on itself and create a black hole.” 

“But ma’am!” the agent protested. “That kind of mission would take half of our fleet! The extraction alone would be ridiculously difficult--”

“I could do it.” Sarah froze for a moment, then ran to catch up with her leader.

“No--” 

“A small ship could get in through the station and close enough to the star.” 

“Doing that alone is a suicide mission!” she argued. “You’d be caught up in the explosion, or sucked into the black hole, or--” 

Katherine shot her a smile. “Have a little faith in me, Sarah. And besides, if I die taking down my father’s empire, then so be it.” 

“But--” 

They had reached the loading bay. Katherine slammed her hand on the button and gave the agent a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself. However, if something does happen…” she reached up to her chest, undid her Resistance pin, and handed it to Sarah. “You’ll be in command of the fleet.” 

The agent clutched her fist around the small gold object and stared up at Katherine with worried eyes. “I can’t take this, ma’am.’ 

The leader put a hand on her shoulder. “Yes you can. You’ve shown remarkable resolve in helping me with this. The others will listen to you.” 

And with that, Katherine spun into the bay and jumped into a ship. As the hood slid down over her face, she couldn’t help but clench her shaking fists. 

 

* * *

 

“What’s your play?!” Jack demanded, brandishing the gun. Davey desperately looked between him and Pulitzer. “Tell me!” 

“Pull the trigger,” Pulitzer urged, his mouth contorted into a maleficent grin. “Do it, Jack!” 

“Jack, let’s just go--” 

“You know what I’m going to do, Captain Kelly?” Pulitzer interrupted with an evil sneer. “Once I make it out of here, and I  _ will,  _ I’m going to send General Snyder and the Delanceys after your precious crew and I’m going to make sure  _ all  _ of them end up on the  _ Refuge.  _ Of course, if a few are tragically lost during a firefight, then nobody would really notice, now would they? Now, I know you-- _ you,  _ Jack, are Mr. Tough Guy, but I imagine that poor crippled boy wouldn’t fare so well under Snyder’s oversight, would he? Or even Mr. Jacobs here, I’m guessing a few weeks without his treatment would not end well--” 

**_Bang!_ **

The end of the gun smoked and Davey couldn’t help but clap a hand to his mouth. Jack, eyes wide, just as shocked as Davey, lowered his gun and stared in horror at the scene in front of him because Pulitzer  _ didn’t  _ collapse, but simply smirked as the image of him, outlined in a holographic blue, flickered once, twice--

And disappeared. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter guys!!


	15. Finale

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *inhales*  
> aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa--

 

_And would it have been worth it, after all,_

_Would it have been worth while,_

_After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,_

_After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—_

_And this, and so much more?—_

_Was it worth it?_

 

* * *

 

A single ethereal ship soared alone in the black expanse as the light of a dying star glinted off its hull like diamonds among the cosmos.

Its mission, bold and brave, but deadly and doomed from the start: to escort the phase-three neutron orb into its demise and, along with it, take the broken pieces of wealth and society. This ship would make history, remembered for ages to come as the catalyst that sparked a revolution against corruption and the immoral elite.

This ship, once it reaches its target, would bring about the downfall of archaic capitalism and eventually the fraudulent Solar Senate. Enslaved workers of the mines would revolt against their chainmasters, breaking free of their bonds once and for all. The people of the dying planets would take up arms against unlawful Senators that would try to impose an embargo on their oxygen trade in order to get their way. And the masses of the Universe would join their cries in Resistance and bring down the confining pillars of the bureaucracy that had been crushing them for so long--and they would do it under the name of Katherine Pulitzer.

And there she sat now, alone in a tiny cockpit, eyes narrowed in determination as she pushed forward on her thrusters and aimed for the enormous star that lay in the heart of the web.

And she was afraid. She was very, very afraid and lonely, and in that moment as she stared into the soul of a fading star that loomed up before her, she also felt incredibly small.

Light encompassed her as she drew nearer, scorching away the darkness that lurked inside her ship and her heart, and the flames burned the thin outer walls. The engines smoked and sputtered to a stop, but she had reached the point of no return. The gravity of the star had taken over and was drawing her in, so Katherine lifted her hands from the controls and waited to die.

It was fitting, she supposed, the heat growing ever stronger, that her life was to end like this. She spent every moment of the past two decades trying to get away from her father, and yet here she was now, in the center of his web, delivering the blow that would bring about his destruction. And, though she didn’t know it at the time, their names would live on infinitely in tandem, good vs evil, parent vs child, captivity vs freedom, and as she flew into the light Katherine would finally step out from under her father’s shadow.

So she shed no tears.

Katherine Pulitzer, the leader of the Resistance, the embodiment of revolution and freedom and all things good and just, took a deep breath and soared into the sun.

And just like that, it was over.

___  
_ _ _

* * *

 

A smoking gun clattered to the floor, dropped by the boy’s shaking hands as the room began to rumble.

Brilliant white light flooded the room as objects on the desk began to clatter and crash to the ground, and soon the floor of the cabin was bucking and knocking both Davey and Jack off of their feet.

“ _Shit!”_ Jack cursed, reaching out to steady Davey as they were both thrown to the side. “Come on, Davey we need to get out of here--”

“But, Pulitzer!” the Junkie protested, reaching out for the space where he had stood mere seconds ago.

“Don’t worry about him!” Jack shouted over the thundering noise and the blaring of alarms. “We need to get out of here!”

“No!” Davey yelled, his voice breaking, straining against him. “He can’t--he-he- _can’t--_ the investigation--”

Jack gritted his teeth and shot a desperate look out the window. The star was collapsing in on itself, releasing wave after wave of pure energy. It wouldn’t be long before the first one hit, and the entire Headquarters would be destroyed.

He knelt down next to Davey and took his face in his hands. “Look at me!” he pleaded. “We need to go-- _right now,_ or we won’t make it out of here alive and it will all be for nothing!”

“He’s got--he’s got the neon…” the Junkie whispered, cracking and on the verge of tears. “He’s probably miles away! It _was_ all for nothing!”

“No,” Jack corrected, and pulled Davey close. “It won’t be if we both get out with our lives. Do you understand? If we-if _you_ live, it won’t be for nothing.”

Davey nodded slowly as the weight of the situation finally dawned on him, snapping himself out of his stupor. He wiped his eyes, and together they stumbled toward the door.

Jack dragged the Junkie down the hallway and to the loading dock, gripping his hand tightly. They dodged broken pieces falling from the ceiling, skirted personnel who were running rampant to the emergency escape pods, leaped over toppled pillars on the ground, and the whole time Davey just fixed his gaze on the back of the Captain’s head and didn’t look away.

He led them through the askew doors, into the massive loading dock where the _Refuge_ had been parked. Davey stared at it in wonder.

“How…”

“I’ll tell you later!” Jack shouted and jerked him toward the ramp. He turned to a prisoner, who was standing nervously by the door. “Close it, Sling!” The boy nodded and slammed a button. Warning lights flashed and the incline began to raise. “Get Sneaky Eyes up to the Deck, and tell the rest to strap in!”

He nodded and took off down the hall the opposite direction. Jack pulled Davey down a series of complex twists and turns.

“You flew this here by yourself?” Davey panted as they ran.

“It’s not that hard.”   
_“Not that hard?!”_

They turned into the Deck and Jack skidded to the controls. Another prisoner was there, frantically throwing switches left and right.

“Engines are powered on, Captain!” he shouted, and Jack grabbed the wheel.

“Hang on tight!” he warned, and the _Refuge_ flipped around and shot out from the bay.

Davey fell back against a dashboard and wrapped his arms around it, clinging on for dear life. Out the window and past the flames, he could make out the first shock wave hit the Headquarters. The structure practically dissolved under the force of the star’s energy, and the wave ripped through each metal spire like it was paper. The destruction was quickly gaining on them.

“We’re not gonna make it!” he shouted.

“We’ll make it!” Jack gritted, slamming forward on the thrusters and a fresh tug threw Davey backward.

But the light and the heat were just as strong, and it was starting to blind him as it drew ever closer. The ship was fast, sure, but the wave of pure energy was hurtling through space at breakneck speeds.

“ _Jack_!”

Captain Jack threw his full weight on the wheel, but he had already maxed out the thrusters, and the heat and the pull of gravity were beginning to clench his chest. Each breath was more and more shallow, each movement more and more panicked. He could hear the screech of metal as the engines were ripped apart from the speed.

“This ship isn’t designed to fly this fast!” Sneaky Eyes shouted. “We aren’t--”

With a sudden jolt, the speed of the _Refuge_ tripled and the three boys in the Deck were thrown to the side.

“What--?” Jack started, but Davey cheered from where he lay on the floor.

“It’s Crutchie!”

Sure enough, the _Manhattan_ had appeared beside them, great and impressive and strong, and a sight for Jack’s sore eyes. The _Refuge_ jerked slightly as the leash was attached, and then the _Manhattan_ fired their thrusters and they shot off into the depths of space.

Through the window, they could see what was left of World Headquarters being demolished behind them, and though Davey hated that Pulitzer had gotten away, he relished in the fact that it was the very foundation of his empire that had been his downfall.

He had no idea how true that statement really was.

___  
_ _ _

* * *

 

The Solar Senate had agents out within the hour to asses the damage. After a thorough investigation, they declared that the neutron star had indeed collapsed into a black hole, taking with it every last piece of World Headquarters, and since Pulitzer himself had disappeared (presumed dead, despite the protests of Jack and Davey), there was no further need to follow through in his trial. General Conlon, along with his friend, Senator Teddy Roosevelt, had tried for an appeal but it was voted out. Clearly, none of the other Senators had any interest in dredging up matters that had stayed for so long in the dark.

The Resistance fleet scattered out among the Universe, back into the shadows as they waited and bided their time, and all the while unrest began to grow in the masses. People have an uncanny nose for smelling deceit in the government and whispers of an overthrow wormed its way into their lives. The stories of the great Katherine Pulitzer and her noble sacrifice, augmented by lone Resistance agents, were passed around marketplaces and dinner tables, and soon nearly everyone in the universe knew her name. It was said that a beautiful and unearthly ship traveled about the stars, and if one was lucky enough to board it and break through the dream-like party state, they too could join the cause.

General Conlon was promoted and given command over a fleet of ships. He offered Race a position in the army, since they were no longer ranked so close together, but Race turned him down. He loved the _Brooklyn,_ and he loved Spot, but the _Manhattan_ was where he needed to be. The two still made it a point to see each other as often as possible, of course.

And Captain Jack? Well, he wandered a bit more than most.

He spent the days of the investigation in his cabin, fiddling with junk scraps and lost in thought. He created sculptures of animals and trees and the sun as he pictured greenery in his mind. Space was beautiful… but he wasn’t so sure he could stand it for much longer. Earth was where he belonged….Right?

_“You’d love it though, Crutchie. Earth. D’you know, there they’ve got this thing there called rain? It’s like the stars are falling from the sky, except it’s water—as much as you can possibly drink and more.”_

_“Really?”_

_“Honest. On Earth, there aren’t any tethers or gravity simulators. On Earth, you can go anywhere you want and see anything you want. Crutch, on Earth you can run, really run, through giant fields bigger than any old junker ship. You can feel the wind in your face and it’s like you’re being carried away.”_

A conversation from long ago cropped up his mind, no matter how hard Jack pushed it away. He couldn’t forget Crutchie’s wide, curious eyes that dared to dream of a life beyond the bleakness of space. He couldn’t forget how young _all_ of the crew’s eyes were before this whole fiasco, before he sent them into war. Now, they were as hyper and eager as ever, but near-death experiences like the ones they had just went through… well, that’s not something most people just walk off.

 

In the dark depths of space, just across the Chrysler nebula and behind the broken pieces of the Harlem belt, an old Junker ship floated lazily in the stars.

Jack was staring at those stars.

Big and beautiful and full of secrets and mysteries just waiting to be unraveled, they danced in their place in the sky. There was once a time where he thought they twinkled like diamonds, shallow and pretty, and the glitter was the only merit they had to them. Now he knew they were full of a much deeper intelligence, these stars, older than time. Their lifetimes were longer than any human’s, no matter how long mankind remained asleep in stasis, and Jack just knew they had so much to offer beneath the surface. Each glimmering light contained millions of lives, lived and not lived, millions of memories, millions of songs, sung and unsung. Each shining orb was a capsule filled with human stories, sealed until the end of everything.

These lights, they pierced the darkness not to drive it away, but to give it depth. To give it meaning. To give it a place to reside.

Footsteps slowly approached behind him and, without turning, Jack spoke. “Beautiful, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Davey muttered, carefully taking a seat on the grate next to him. “I’ve seen them every night of my life, but… they never cease to amaze me.”

Jack exhaled and smiled. “You’re easy to impress, ain’t ya Davey?”

Davey gave him an exasperated look. “Tell me you _weren’t_ just sitting here by yourself and thinking about the stars.”

“You got me there,” Jack admitted, spreading his heads, and they both turned back to look out the window.

After a beat, “You really gonna leave the _Manhattan?”_ Davey asked, his voice low and steady, like he was forcing himself not to show any emotion. Jack glanced at him, the boy sitting up rigidly straight and doing his best not to meet his Captain’s eyes. “I’ve seen your sculptures. You only make that many if it’s about something that’s really on your mind.”

“What, you gonna miss me?” Jack teased.

“I just--” Davey burst suddenly. “I just don’t understand. What does Earth got that you ain’t right here? With us? Earth’s got… skies of smoke and streets packed with people and deadly animals and--Jack. Why are you so desperate to leave us for _that_?”

The Captain’s eyes hardened. How many countless times must he explain himself? “I _seen_ the Earth, and there’s more to it than that. I seen _green._ And color. Flowers, and big fields of water as blue as anything. I’ve waited my whole life to go back, especially now, after we've been through so much--you just, you don’t know what it’s _like_ , Davey. To get a glimpse of something beautiful, and then spend your whole life just out reach of it. To have it just between your fingertips, all to let it slip away again and again!” He took a deep breath, realizing with a twinge of shock he had shouted the last part and released the fist he had balled his fingers into.

“I know what it’s like,” Davey said quietly as his eyes lowered, and the tension shattered. He didn’t say it to argue, or to get back at Jack. No, he said it with remorse and regret and pain and Jack’s heart dropped out of his chest as he remembered that Davey _did_ know what it was like to be chasing something that couldn’t be caught.

“I’m sorry,” he said gently, suddenly ashamed at his outburst. He extended his hand to touch him, to somehow convey his apology through the slightest brush of his fingertips, or the barest pat on the shoulder, but he hesitated, suddenly unsure of himself. His hand hovered in the air for a moment as he debated, and slowly he began to retract it.

But Davey caught his hand, and with it, stole Jack’s breath. “It’s okay,” he murmured, his voice a low hum that seemed to resonate throughout the room. “I know you didn’t mean it.”

“Yeah,” Jack responded softly, frozen with self-doubt. Davey’s hand was smooth and warm, and Jack’s heart pulsed through the skin of his palms. He wanted to draw back and get closer to Davey all at once and the indecision kept him locked in his place. For once, Jack wasn’t sure what to do next.

Davey slowly twisted his palm around and splayed his fingers so their hands were lined up edge to edge, and as they pressed in place a shiver was sent down Jack’s spine.

He was too busy focusing on their hands to notice that Davey had turned, and when Jack looked up he was caught. The look on the boy’s face was wide and vulnerable and innocent, and the stars reflected in the depths of his striking green eyes. His lips were parted slightly, and he looked at Jack with raised eyebrows, and it hit Jack then that Davey was unsure too.

They had somehow drawn closer together, and the air between them was still, their breaths held tightly against their chests. Unable to look away, Jack curled his fingers in and clasped his hand around Davey’s. The stowaway glanced down, in shock or in hesitation, Jack couldn’t tell, but he needed to see those eyes again.

He carefully brought his other hand up and pressed it underneath Davey’s chin, gently lifting his head. Jack could feel Davey’s slight exhale in surprise blow against his face.

“Jack…” he breathed, and at that moment the Captain surged forward and pressed his lips to Davey’s.

A burning chill spread out from his mouth and around to the back of his neck, then slowly snaked down his spine. Kissing Davey was like kissing the ocean: peaceful and grounding and… just so _right_. Natural. In that instant, Jack couldn’t imagine any other place he’d rather be--Earth be damned. No kind of green fields even came close, not as Davey’s hand slid up Jack’s arm and cupping his neck, sending a fresh wave of sparks through his body.

He could feel the waves, the wash of emotions, the riptide that drew him in closer. He could feel the crash of water against the shore as his heart pounded in time to the beat, could feel the depth that laid hidden just underneath. He needed more, and Jack pushed harder, parting his lips and exhaling his name against his mouth.

Davey pulled back slightly, and they hovered there for a moment, their foreheads resting each other as they breathed in tandem.

His hand was still resting on his neck, and Jack leaned into it. “Davey,” he started, and then he couldn’t help it. He grinned, and that grew wider until he was practically giggling.

“What’s so funny?” Davey asked as he too began to laugh. Jack’s smile was contagious, and Jack covered his hand on his neck and pushed it down toward his mouth where he planted several kisses into Davey’s palm.

“I can’t even explain it,” he said, and as his eyes flicked up to meet Davey’s again, he pressed forward and they were together again. Their hands dropped to rest comfortably against each other’s hips, and that’s how they stayed for a long while after.

 

“Pulitzer’s still out there,” Davey muttered quietly, his head curled on Jack’s chest. “He’s still got the neon.”

“Yeah,” the Captain replied absently, running his fingers through the Junkie’s hair. “But he’s not our problem anymore. It took him an entire lifetime to build his empire. He doesn’t have another one to spare.”

He felt Davey nod slightly.

“You ever think…?” Jack faltered.

“What?”

“You ever think about what you’d do differently? If you could do it all over again?”

Davey sighed. “Yeah. There isn’t much I could have done about it, but I wish… I wish I hadn’t had this stupid condition. I wish I could have stayed on the _Manhattan_ with the rest of the crew, and actually _helped,_ you know? Instead of just sleeping the whole battle away.”

“Hey,” Jack corrected, tipping Davey’s face up with a hand. “You saved my ass, that’s for sure.”

The boy snorted and turned back down. “I guess so.”

“I wish I could have done more, too,” Jack started, bitterness twisting his tongue. “I wish I hadn’t left, I wish I hadn’t given Pulitzer the neon like an idiot. I wish I would have shot the gun earlier, or-or--”

Davey sat up straight and looked Jack in the eyes, his expression sending tingles down his spine.

“Don’t you say that,” he said forcibly. The Captain flushed. “You freed an entire ship full of boys who had been wrongly imprisoned and abused. You piloted that ship _by yourself_ into Pulitzer’s Headquarters undetected and then flew it out again at a ridiculously high speed, escaping the force of a black hole and saving all of our lives. Jack,” He leaned in and placed a small kiss on his lips. “You literally defied nature. Give yourself some credit.”

Jack allowed himself a small, bashful smile. “Yeah, well, you too. You deserve more too.”

“Plus,” Davey continued, dropping his voice and brushing a speck of dust off Jack’s shoulder. “You only shot Pulitzer after he threatened me.”

Jack laughed, scratching his neck. “You noticed that?”

“I noticed.”

The two of them bantered for a while in the dark until Davey fell asleep in Jack’s lap, but he stayed up to watch the stars pass by. Somehow, the black didn’t look so bleak anymore. Somehow, the green in his head wasn’t as attractive. Here, next to Davey, space seemed even more infinite in its wonders and secrets, and if Jack was being honest with himself, he couldn’t wait to explore them now.   

“I have a confession to make…” he muttered, his back firm against the wall behind him. Davey’s head was dropped on his shoulder and his chest rose and fell slowly. His eyes fluttered slightly when Jack spoke, but he didn’t move. “I don’t want to leave.”

He looked down at Davey, and carefully reached a hand up and around as he stroked the Junkie’s hair.

“I’d rather just stay here forever.”

___  
_ _ _

* * *

 

The morning bell rang, and gradually the sounds of tired Junkies filled the halls of the _Manhattan._

“Up! Up! Up!” Jack called as he walked down, banging on closed doors. “Come on boys, this ship ain’t gonna fly itself!”

“Why can’t Race just do it?” Albert groaned from underneath a pillow in one of the last rooms.   
Race yanked the pillow from his arms. “Ah, get up, you lazy ass. I can’t be doing all the work.”

“Why not?” the Junkie returned, pulling another one out of seemingly nowhere. Elmer stepped out of the bathroom fully dressed, grabbed Albert’s sheets, and with a mighty heft, yanked them off the bed. The boy came crashing down with them.

“Because,” he said as he grinned and neatly folded the covers. “If it were just Race, we’d’ve crashed by now.”

Race made a move as if to whack him, but Elmer jumped out of the way and sprang through their door, out into the hallway.

Albert groaned from the floor as light shined directly on his face.

“What’sa matter, Bert?” Jojo called from across the hallway. “Hungover?”

“Nah,” he shot back, as he reluctantly sat up and glared. “You and Romeo kept me up last night.”

Jojo sighed and rolled his eyes. Further in the room, Romeo grinned and flashed a thumbs up.

“Hey Romeo!” Buttons shouted from his room. “If I’m remembering right, you still owe for that poker game!”

Race piped up, “Oh yeah, Buttons, you’re still willing to give me some of that right?” He suddenly froze, his playful expression gone as he grabbed for something to steady himself. “Holy shit guys, I just realized something.” The Junkies hushed, staring expectantly at him.

He slapped a palm to his forehead. “I left the fucking _Corona_ at World Headquarters!”

The halls erupted into roaring laughter, and they all went back to their routines. Elmer patted him on the back sympathetically.

“It’s okay man, you’ll get over it.”

“Yeah!” Specs jumped in from the hallway. “Did I ever tell you about that time I lost my shoe--?”

“We know about your goddamn shoe, Specs!” Tommy Boy shouted.   
“Let’s talk about something new for a change!”

“Not necessary,” Race grumbled from behind his hands.

The Captain picked that moment to walk by the room at that moment.

“Speaking of something new,” Finch said to Henry. “Hey Jack! Is it true you and Davey was mugging on the observatory deck last night?”

Jack stopped and slowly turned around, his face the embodiment of bewildered. “How the hell would you know that, Finch?”

“Smalls told me.”

Jack opened his mouth to say something, then shook his head. “You’se all a buncha sharks, ya know? Can’t nobody keep their business to themselves these days,” he muttered, stomping down the hallway toward the Deck.

Tommy Boy stuck his head out of his room. “So is it true?”

“Mind ya own business!” Jack threw over his shoulder and turned out of sight.

Albert raised an eyebrow at Race. “What do you think?”

“They definitely did,” Crutchie cut in out of nowhere as he made his way down the hall. “Did you see his smile?” A chorus of ‘ooohs’ rose up from the rooms.

“Hey where is Davey, after all?” Race asked, finally dropping his hands. Crutchie smiled wickedly.

“He’s coming in behind me.”

Right on cue, Davey hurried down the hallway, flattening his collar.

The poor boy had no idea what was coming.

 

__

* * *

 

Jack reclined in his Captain’s chair, sighing in satisfaction.

“It’s been too long,” he muttered affectionately, stroking the armrests. He sincerely missed his position on the Deck, high up above the rest and looking down on the stars out the window. The morning had chased away all of last night’s doubts and he knew it, right here was where he needed to be.

The Junkies filled in one by one and sat at their stations. Race took his position by the controls, Specs at the monitor, Mike and Ike up front, and Davey and Crutchie stood on either side of Jack. Even Les had a place. He had quite taken to Albert, and the two of them were currently pulling apart a panel full of wiring. The new guys, Sneaky Eyes and Sling, were off in the corner making friends with Sniper and Smalls. Chatter gradually rose up on the Deck as the _Manhattan_ rolled over and light flooded the room.

“Hey Jack!” Race asked, turning toward him with a grin. “Where we off to?”

Captain Jack Kelly grinned, glancing up at Davey. The boy reached down and took his hand, and Jack shrugged. “You choose!” he replied.

Race flashed him a thumbs up, and slowly the ship started to move out of the shadows--

And into the light, the universe, and beyond.  

 

 

 

**End of part three.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Jack and Davey will most likely return in a future fic. I want to write more, but turns out writing for almost 18 days straight is a little tiring... who knew? Stay tuned!* 
> 
> I... wow.  
> I'm gonna be honest with you all, I did not expect this fic to be what it was. This is the first time I have actually written something (to completion) with more than three or four chapters. But it's like this story took on a life of its own--you guys saw, I just kept adding chapters as I wrote. Space isn't typically what one associates with an 1890's newspaper strike, but this fic has actually been getting quite a bit of traffic. Thank you all so much! 
> 
> A big shout out to my beta, musicluyva213, and to everyone who has been commenting on almost every chapter I post. I haven't replied to all of them, but just know that you all make my day! Really, it means a lot.
> 
> A quick comment on the tech jargon in this fic. Everything is based off of a small amount of research I did. Neon in its liquid form, according to google, is often found in cryogenics so that science isn't totally unfounded. Neutron stars are a real thing, as well as the strength of their gravity, however it would take a little more than an anti-particle engine to turn it into a black hole, and that won't just happen in an instant either. And Davey's condition is based off of theory--spending a lot of time in space causes one's bones to grow weaker so that person can't function under gravity, but I took a few liberties with it. To make a long tangent short, don't use the jargon in this fic to study for your science test! 
> 
> Epigraphs were a combination of poetry, song lyrics, and quotes from the musical. If you want to know what any of them were from, just ask. Or you can probably copy and paste into google. 
> 
> I'm glad all of you liked it, and if any of you have any requests for stories (both in this universe and out) don't hesitate to shoot me a message here, or on tumblr @they-think-they-got-us.
> 
> Have a wonderful day!  
> -EasternStarling


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